The Poet's Yoke

 

A waltz with words that waft and twirl across a ballroom floor

The laughter of a little girl drifting from worlds of yore

A sense of imminence immersed in steadfast, common care

Of workaday and bills to pay and suppers to prepare

A sentimental ballad slipping through matters of fact

The art of bearing verses while keeping façade intact

And balancing the beckoning of worlds in want of ink

With sensible responses like cleaning the kitchen sink

To siphon from life’s thrum the rolling of a sort of sea

Rife with glints of spent summer and tomorrow’s mystery

Requires tireless patience while panning for lilt and rhyme

(This is not for the faint of heart, the art stealing time)

The poet’s yoke is made of air yet weighs a whisper-ton

With lyrics waiting to be snared and tamed and poem-spun

From brooding skies and sparkling eyes, from goodbyes and hellos

Each day unfurls a paradise of poems to compose

The merchant laughs and stuffs the chaff of trade into his sack

The maiden blushes; hopes he looks while she is looking back

The traffic rushes, the rain hisses underneath each wheel

The poet smiles and gathers manna for another meal

The poet's yoke is lily-soft yet claws the cloak of souls

With merciless persistence because always death's bell tolls

And who knows when the pen may fall prey to its solemn chime 

As the poet turns to behold the Giver of the rhyme 

 

Oh, pray they serve with honor the onus of pen and page

Because the life of written word survives from age to age

And who knows who will pause to read the stuff of wrangled ink

Therefore, the yoke should weigh enough to make the poet think

© Janet Martin

Okay, that's all for today, folks!

Wow! and maybe this year!

 Depends how tomorrow goes!

With much love, 

Janet

Wishing for us all, for 2023

 a fresh awareness of God

and a deeper reverence for Him,

 from whom all blessings flow

A Little Lilt of Everlasting Praise

A little end-of-year reflection of thankfulness

and worship that pray, has barely begun!

Life is a collection of moment-pixels!

Give thanks! 

I confess its a bit of a Poem-blitz today...

a way to keep the wick of gladness trimmed and hope's flame lit, 

where so much sadness threatens to permanently snuff it, 

without reminders of why it never can! 

hallelujah!

Thank-you for sin’s redemption paid through the blood of Your Son

Thank-you for full forgiveness for the wrongs that we have done

Thank-you for Your sweet promise as confession’s sorrows pour

When You forgive our sins, God, You remember them no more

Thank-you for the Lamp of Your Word to light the path of life

Because the throughway to Your throne is full of grief and strife

Thank-you that we have access where the temple’s veil is rent

To come to You, not through a priest but through Your covenant

Thank-you that what this world can never give, You will supply

Your wellsprings of goodness and love will never drain or dry

Thank-you for more than we deserve because You love us so

And nothing here is greater than the grace that You bestow

Thank-you for the true beauty of hope’s unmerited worth

To crown the countless beauties lavishing heavens and earth

Thank-you for what creation spills before our wond’ring eyes

Thank-you for what salvation seals, revealed in paradise

Thank-you for holy purpose in what would be commonplace

But love turns into worship’s joyful gratitude for grace

Thank-you for the gift of Today; where no two are the same

Thank-you that You hear everyone who calls upon Your name

Thank-you that You abide and that You work for our good

And that what we confide in You is always understood

Thank-you for eyes to see and ears to hear, thought to recall

Your precious promises and bounty's blessings great and small

For feet to walk and hands to tend to tasks or fold in prayer

Thank-you that whatever we ask, we know you hear and care

Thank-you for friends and family, for home, sweet home and such

For faces in our memory, we can no longer touch

For Your faithful companionship as we take up our cross

For the gain of your comfort in the pain of our loss

Thank-you that You are with us thus we are never alone

Thank-you, for every stumbling block, there is a stepping stone

Thank-you for food to eat and clothes to wear and work to do

Thank-you that You are absolute, omnipotent and true

Thank-you for what we learn through the bitter rue of mistakes

To humble wisdom's crown we earn as pride’s countenance breaks

Thank-you for gardens out-of-doors or on a windowsill

Thank-you for pups and kittens, for the birds that flit and trill

Thank-you for the raincloud that pours Your answer to our plea

For the wee baby that restores joy in humanity

Thank-you for soft sunshine that warms away cold winter’s gloom

Thank-you for seeds instilled with miracles of bud and bloom

Thank-you for toil’s gracious reward of slumber, sound and deep

Thank-you for vital vim restored after a good night’s sleep

Thank-you for a pricked conscience to rebuke the erring mind

For the refuge of perfect peace that all who trust will find

For Your green pastures and still waters, when courage obeys

For Your goodness and mercy to follow us all our days

Thank-you God for your faithfulness transcending time and place

For hymns made possible because You love vile, human race

Thank-you, oh God, that nothing is impossible with You

No matter what, there is nothing too hard for You to do

Thank-you that You have proven by what death’s tomb could not stay

Your power and Your glory and Your Kingdom now for aye

No army you can defeat You and no evil overthrow

For You have overcome the world, in spite of trouble’s woe

And all who repent and believe, fight a most worthwhile fight

For You will be the One they/we see when faith is turned to sight

Thank-you that You are slow to anger, abounding in love

And for your patient kindness as You chasten and reprove

Thank-you for living hope to spur us onward until we

Together with You Lord, thank you through all eternity

© Janet Martin

Psalm 103:1-5

Praise the Lord, my soul;
    all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
2 Praise the Lord, my soul,
    and forget not all his benefits—
3 who forgives all your sins
    and heals all your diseases,
4 who redeems your life from the pit
    and crowns you with love and compassion,
5 who satisfies your desires with good things
    so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

Thoroughfares of Retrospect

Our mind is the control tower of our life~

Charles Stanley

As we look back on another year almost spent

we traverse thoroughfares of retrospect, don't we?!

My, oh my-oh-my!

What a showcase of mistakes and mercies!

Sometimes it appears technology has

reduced attention-spans to tik-tok sized snippets!

How much is lost at great cost!!

Listening to a message like the one below 

means taking the time to turn off distractions

in order to fuel thought with good counsel!

So worth the time it takes!

Will you join the millions and millions who 

have taken the time to listen to this message?

Taking Control of your Thoughts- Charles Stanley

And if life does not allow the freedom right now to listen to the whole of it,

The first two minutes offer SO much to think about, 

until you have time for the remainder!

In retrospect we realize what matters does not change

Where guests that the mind entertains proves who we love the most

And though we cannot keep so much of what the years estrange

We can take careful charge of thought’s dinner-parties we host

And prepare with a wary heart, the table where Thought lolls

Before the hand reveals that part that the mind first cajoles

In retrospect we find what wise and fool's proof  cannot null

Who we love most is soon exposed by time’s tender romance

Who we revere and hold most dear is clearly visible

By what we choose and how we use the blessings that God grants

Where Thought is like a banquet table laden with buffets

Where so much good and so much bad can capture our gaze

In retrospect we see how swift time’s subtle shuttle flies

While tears and laughter spill, while we are often filled with awe

At lifetimes woven with the threads of dawn-to-dusk’s demise/disguise

Where thought is like an evil god if left to its own law

And ignorance is like a noose dangling from gallows where

Time’s subtle shuttles fly while Thought offers Fresh Thought a chair

In retrospect we oft admit we did not do our best

To bid Thought to pay sacred, meeker, and more earnest heed

To what God says rather than what Well-meaning Thoughts suggest

Where holiness, not happiness should be Thought’s primal greed

Because the lot of the undying soul is undeterred

Thus Thought should feed its dinner-guests with counsel from God’s Word

…where Thoroughfares of Retrospect spread out a humbling feast

For Thought is always hungry and the Tempter always near

And we concede at best Thought is a needy, bumbling beast

Subject to err without God’s Word to gird and commandeer

Therefore, no matter what befalls Thought’s menus to arrange

In retrospect we realize what matters does not change

© Janet Martin

Col.3:2

 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.

What is the Use?

I got a mega-reality-jolt as I lined up the calendars of years flying by!

Reminding me of this verse!

James 4:14

What is your life? 

You are a mist that appears for a little while 

and then vanishes.

What is the use of passing years

If at their end we find

When its last moment disappears

We are still no more kind

What is the use of each year’s cast

Fastened to ‘how time flies’

If when its final day has passed

We still are no more wise

What use is time’s swift no return

Gifted in day-to-day

If  love's lessons we ought to learn

Have not taught us to pray

What is the use of good intent

Of resolution's dare

If we are, at the old year’s end

No better than we were

What is the use, when looking back

With sentimental heart

We blush to see that we still lack

What we did at the start?  

What is the use of  all we chase 

Like a red, rubber ball

If God's goodness, mercy and grace

Have not changed us at all

© Janet Martin

Psalm 90:12

Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

Eph.5:15-21

See then that you walk [e]circumspectly, not as fools but as wise,

  16redeeming the time, because the days are evil.

17Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. 

18And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; 

but be filled with the Spirit, 

19speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,

 singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord,

20giving thanks always for all things 

to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,

21submitting to one another in the fear of [f]God.

Frameworks of Farewell

 

The framework of farewell is filled with moments spilled and spent

Into a little locket frilled with laughter and lament

Where what we argue or reject, or believe and embrace

Becomes part of the retrospect that farewell’s frames showcase

Sometimes it seems I almost see Father Time tease my sigh

With a fedora jauntily pulled down over one eye

He tips his hat and with the other hand touches my cheek

‘There, there, you know I understand the words you cannot speak’

Sometimes I think I sense him wink as one more year becomes

The latest, stationary link of soldered cookie crumbs

And sums soft-shook from flowers that we plant, then pluck and press

Between books filled with hours of love’s hopeful happiness

Where bittersweet, an echo-fleet embarks upon a sea

That surges with the thrum of bare feet lost on Bygone’s lea

Where frames of farewell gaped while hellos rang in the New Year

From thresholds barely shaped before their doorways disappear

...into the mist of faces kissed and arms that ache because

We cannot gather back the vista of The Way/Day That Was

Where the New Year that tolled a bell dangling from midnight’s skies

 Is stilled in frameworks of farewell with now Old Year’s demise

Darling, (dear, Father Time, forgive my bold intimacy)

But you perplex the poet's rhyme without apology 

And vex brave fantasy with fact; darling, then hold me near

And I will hold your hat while you kiss away yesteryear  

© Janet Martin

With Love that Never Fails (As Surely as the Morn)

But as for me, I will sing of Your strength;

Yes, I will joyfully sing of Your faithfulness in the morning,

For You have been my refuge

And a place of refuge on the day of my distress.

17 My strength, I will sing praises to You;

For God is my refuge, 

the [t]God who shows me favor.

Psalm 59:16-17

We can so easily get caught up, attracted and distracted by what we see

rather than what we know is so because God said it!

The One who constantly awes us with masterpieces

of morning sky and nature's my-oh-my,

He is our refuge and strength!

Though so much seems to fail

Never The Hand that draws

The break of day across the vale

That groans with mercy’s cause/laws

And unfolds in the palm

Of grace, the molten sky

And parts the wingspan of the dawn

Like a new butterfly

Where we, creatures of dust

And mist/must of numbered days

So often fail to fully trust

The higher thoughts and ways

Of He who never fails

Is spite of what some say

Even while mercy’s Hand unveils

And grants another day

Where morn-to-morn unfolds

(a twinkle in time’s eye)

Exteriors that man beholds

Beneath fringes of sky

Where so much seems to fail

When weighed by what we see

In worship’s hour of travail

Before eternity

Consider this, dear friend

Before we shake a fist

And curse He whose mercies attend

Both saint and atheist

Who makes the rain to fall?

Who does love emerge from?

Who paid sin’s ransom, once for all?

And calls on all to ‘come’?

He knows each creature care

And suffered every one

Because Love did not choose to spare

The status of His Son

A manger met His birth

A cross displayed His death

Where no one could fathom the work

Fulfilled at his last breath

Then, though so much seems loss

Remember, we behold

As they who stood beneath the cross

But fringes of the Whole

Where, though thought’s logic fails

Never the Hand of He

Scarred with the imprint of the nails

That set death’s captives free

He is the King of kings

He is the Lord of lords

Who bore salvation's sufferings

Beneath the thrust of swords

With love that never fails

As surely as the morn

The landscape of life's path unveils 

His mercies are reborn 

© Janet Martin

As surely as the morn

The landscape of life's path unveils, 

His mercies are reborn 

Of Glorious Winter-tide

This week its the snow!!!

The other week the ice left us speechless with awe!!

Now is the time of cheer

Of cozy countryside

Tucked beneath white starlight veneer

Or the veil of a bride

Now is the time to pause

From plant and harvest toil

While earth receives the wild applause

Of gales and sparkle-spoil

Of snowflakes swirling round

In dizzying descent

Until the land is grandly crowned

With frosty filament

Now is the time to ling-

-ger longer in a book

And let the days of winter bring

The days summer forsook

Of bowers bent with leaf

Of flower-befringed walks

Of glad tidings of golden sheaf

Of rose and hollyhocks

Of looking back to where

We find ourselves today

Before we turn agape to stare

At worlds melted away

Where now is the sweet time

To slow our hasting stride

And revel in the crystal clime

Of glorious winter-tide

...as we combat the cold

That keens our appetite

With supper hour dipped in gold 

Of gentle candle-light 

   

© Janet Martin

A Love-ly Light

Matt.5:16

Let your light so shine before men,

 that they may see your good works, 

and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

Don't you love

the light of love

in loved one's eyes?

Esp. children!!

don't you love the way they shine

with love without disguise?

and don't you hope and pray that we,

God's precious girl and boy

look at our Daddy lovingly

then shine and shine with joy?!!

Love does not scorn its charge

Nor loathe its perfect law

But lets the grace of God enlarge

Faith’s diligence with awe

Love, the Light of the world

Has pierced sin’s darkness through

It is God’s evidence unfurled

To shine in me and you

…to glorify the Name

Of He who came to save

And live God’s goodness to proclaim

For the gift His love gave

It is impossible

To confess ‘Christ in me’

Without love’s candle visible

For all the world to see

Then pray the Lord to keep

Our love from growing dim

Lest unawares, we fall asleep

And cease to shine for Him

Lord, let our light so shine

So that all men may see

The evidence of love divine

Bringing glory to Thee

Oh, what a lovely Light

The love of God instills

Where until faith is turned to sight

His glory spills and spills

 

© Janet Martin

This is one of the songs the choir hoped to sing at our church on Christmas Eve.

Though we were disappointed to cancel the service

NOTHING can cancel the true believer's joy and or the Light of the World!

Sing Hallelujah!!

Light of the World

Winsome Woo

The magnitude of the snow-majesty we are enjoying is impossible

to capture with a camera-lens!

It rouses within a winsome woo words cannot capture quite...

Now woos a winsome sense of blues. Of golds and grays and greens

Impressionistic avenues woven through wafting scenes

Of unfurled hues of joy and strife’s herculean highs and lows

Where morn to eventide rolls rife with all that life bestows

And season-song cuts like a knife where so-long ebbs and flows

The catalyst to letting go can shield us from the sum

Of touch and taste and holding’s holy showdowns yet to come

Where youth soon dons truth’s tinges; it is futile to rebel

Where summer’s flashy fringes deck the halls of autumn’s knell

Where hello always hinges to the framework of farewell

Because beginnings always end and ‘end’ always begins

Now woos a winsome sense of friendship through what always thins

To Old Year almost over where the New Year waits to spill

Both knee-deep dell of clover and steep, courage-honing hill

New worlds yet to discover and blank pages yet to fill

Now woos within the stark, dark imminence of vast unknowns

A sense of golds and blues that mark the ‘Thence’ of Steppingstones

That ultimately lead toward That Single Certainty

Of face-to-face with Christ the Lord and of eternity

Thus, therefore, no one can afford to ignore what will be

Where we are lavished with what slips through fingertips with ease

To leave behind the winsome fellowship of memories

Where heartstrings bind the ties of love, of hope and hunger too

Around impressions of a glove filled with the winsome woo

Of what is never quite enough of love’s green-gold-gray-blue

© Janet Martin

Let Joy Ring Through the World

I hope you all had a wonderful day...

Here it felt like it went from morning

... to night in no time at all!!

Let joy ring through the world

The light of life is born

The One the prophets long foretold

Has put on human form

The hope of nations cries

A Babe in manger bed

Unveils God’s face before man’s eyes

As God and man are wed

The heights of Heaven bend

To dredge the depths of death

A gift man cannot comprehend

Has drawn salvation’s breath

Then praise the Name of He

Who saves us from our sins

So death/hell does not seize victory

When End of Days begins

Let worship’s song resound

As we rejoice and pray

Glad tidings of great joy abound

Even unto this day

Then bow with heart undone

Before our God of grace

Because He gave His only Son

To die in our place

...and make God's glory/love's story known

That angels still applaud

The King of kings stepped from His throne

To be the Lamb of God

© Janet Martin

Hallelujah, though colorful cookies are a nice, sweet

celebration treat

Christmas is SO much more!

It is the celebration of mankind's hope 

we tell to our children so they may tell their children!

My Christmas Prayer

From our house to yours-Merry Christmas!

The plan was to be part of a choir at church tonight at

 our Christmas Eve celebration

Celebration/worship is still happening at home, but not the choir!

Everyone is storm-stayed far and wide due to the 'crippling blizzard'!

Still

May we rejoice as we reflect on the Reason for the season,

and the Reason for the believer's joy!

This poem was also going to be shared tonight at the Christmas Eve service

I share it with all of you now, my prayer for us all,

 as we celebrate our Saviour's birth!  

My prayer for every one of us, for each day that we live

Is that we taste the joy of Jesus, only He can give

The glad tidings of joy angels proclaimed, in days of old

I pray, just as the shepherds did, we hasten to behold

And though we do not kneel, as they, that night at Bethlehem

I pray, that daily we rehearse the day we look on Him

And that the joy of living hope is like a Light unfurled

Because by faith we have beheld the Saviour of the world

I pray the joy of Jesus melts each shadow of a doubt

As we receive the Reason that Christmas is all about

Then, come what may, I pray that nothing in this world can dim

Joy’s Star, as we, like the Wisemen have come to worship Him

© Janet Martin

From me to all of you who faithfully drop by my 'poem-porch',

wishes for a blessed Christmas to you and yours!

Luke 2:1-20

And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.

2 (And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.)

3 And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.

4 And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; (because he was of the house and lineage of David:)

5 To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.

6 And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered.

7 And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.

8 And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

9 And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

10 And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

11 For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

12 And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,

14 Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

15 And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us.

16 And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger.

17 And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child.

18 And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds.

19 But Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart.

20 And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them.

Snowbound!

We are in the thick of a blizzard! 

Stay safe and warm!

Now is the hour of reprieve

When every sprig becomes a sheave

Bent with a brumal burst of stars

When featherdown bedecks earth’s bars

As each snow-swaddled house and yard

Composes a vintage post-card

And every home becomes more sweet

When gales go howling down the street

And happiness is safe and sound

When we are cozy and snowbound

When window-frames are works of art

That only winter can impart

When mugs of steaming luxury

Are like hugs of coffee and tea

When nothing presses to be toiled

When we are awe and wonder spoiled

As nature brushes slopes awry

And swirls the scope of land and sky

With wild beauty, while tempests hound

And rile plans with two words; snowbound

Now books are like frigates unfurled

From fireside nooks, across the world

Because, ink snared in verbal font

Can take us anywhere we want

Like travelers who need no fare

To reserve a room or a chair

Clad in comfy flannel and fleece

As we are filled with joy and peace

While wild winds wail, pummel and pound

The storm-tossed seas we sail; snowbound

Soup pots simmer with five-star meals

Thankfulness bows our heads and feels

A hymn no words can capture, quite

As worlds are blurred with white on white

As we pray for the brave who bear

The elements, for creature care

While we are safe and sound and glad

For woodpiles heaped, feet slipper-clad

While winter wonderlands confound

We who are home-sweet-home-snowbound

Now is the hour of content

How swift the gift of came-and-went

Of so-it-goes, this-too-shall-pass

While we peer through snow-swaddled glass

To watch the birds and then recall

‘God sees the little sparrow fall’

Then to let smiles and laughter cheer

The solace of sweet home so dear

While we are snug and safe and sound

In hours of reprieve, snowbound

© Janet Martin

The First Christmas Morn