Showing posts with label Autumn Poem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Autumn Poem. Show all posts

Saturday, October 28, 2023

With All That God Makes Possible...

Happy final golden weekend of October, 2023


In autumn poetry tugs at the heart at every turn
awakening in us the same awe as it did in poets of old...

Psalm 8

 O LORD, our Lord,

how majestic is Your name in all the earth!

You have set Your glory

above the heavens.

2From the mouths of children and infants

You have ordained praiseb

on account of Your adversaries,

to silence the enemy and avenger.

3When I behold Your heavens,

the work of Your fingers,

the moon and the stars,

which You have set in place—

4what is man that You are mindful of him,

or the son of man that You care for him?

5You made him a little lower than the angels;c

You crowned him with glory and honor.

6You made him ruler of the works of Your hands;

You have placed everything under his feet:d

7all sheep and oxen,

and even the beasts of the field,

8the birds of the air and the fish of the sea,

all that swim the paths of the seas.

9O LORD, our Lord,

how majestic is Your name in all the earth!


If at all possible, allow yourself to pause from pressing care
To rest beneath the golden bough slowly but surely growing bare...



Look at the birds and breathe a prayer of thankfulness to He who tends
The creatures of land, sea and air with mercy’s gracious dividends...



If at all possible, delight in simple sight-and-sound of Leaf
Indulge desire’s appetite with wonders, momentous and brief...





If at all possible, allow yourself to pause from pressing care
To rest beneath the golden bough slowly but surely growing bare
Take time to hum a humble hymn of hope, happiness, peace and love
To take note of the gifts that brim from autumn’s dimming treasure trove

Look at the birds and breathe a prayer of thankfulness to He who tends
The creatures of land, sea and air with mercy’s gracious dividends
Now and then commit to ignore the rigid edict of tick-tock
Enjoy falls fading hues before they strew the yard and street and walk

If at all possible, delight in simple sight-and-sound of Leaf
Indulge desire’s appetite with wonders, momentous and brief
Enjoy the view, autumn-dawn pure; of no two days ever the same
Drawing us to our Farewell Tour back to the Hand from whence we came

Explore moments shucked from a sheaf that spills its grief in russet snow
As soft, the earth is tucked beneath a counterpane of Afterglow
If at all possible, allow Autumn’s glory to steal your breath
Before the gold and scarlet bough bears the stark evidence of death

Oh Lord, our Lord, How majestic is Your great name in all the earth
From age to age, You light the wick that kindles worship's awestruck birth
For no mortal can grasp Your ways and thoughts, but should wholly contend 
With all that You make possible, to praise and praise You without end 

© Janet Martin

Explore moments shucked from a sheaf that spills its grief in russet snow
As soft, the earth is tucked beneath a counterpane of Afterglow...



If at all possible, allow Autumn’s glory to steal your breath...
Before the gold and scarlet bough bears the stark evidence of death...



Friday, October 27, 2023

Autumn Joys

 

A few snap-shots from the past few days that helped inspire this poem






The plush hush-hush of feet through leaves...



The plush hush-hush of feet through leaves
The stillness of fields shucked of sheaves
The way the wind through woodland weaves
A canopy of blue
The hurry-scurry, frisky squirrel
The leaf-cartwheel, the boy and girl
Imitating the lilt and twirl
Of treetop’s dwindling hue

Rain-rendered decoupage, wet-cold
Lanes and sidewalks paved with leaf-gold
A little mittened hand to hold
Or steaming cup ‘o joe
Gladness so profound the heart leaps
With praise for squash and pumpkin heaps
And all goodness man plants then reaps
As by God’s grace we go

The five-star bliss of five-star dreams
For five-star supper’s five-star beams
Of five-star happiness that gleams
In loved one’s smiles and eyes
Warmth of homecooked simplicity
And precious love of family
Kindles a thankful-as-can-be
Masterpiece-paradise

The undulating rise and fall
As landscapes pen a madrigal
That needs no words to say it all
Yet leaves spectators awed
By nature’s color-symphony
Spilling across the dimming lea
An autumn song we throng to see
Whose composer is God

© Janet Martin

Rain-rendered decoupage, wet-cold...


Lanes and sidewalks paved with leaf-gold...







Wednesday, October 25, 2023

Panning For Autumn Gold or Because of Farewell's Winning Ways

 I want to learn the fine art of panning for autumn-gold...


To marvel at grand frescos etched on ceilings of thin air
Before time’s hand runs fingers through treetops silent and bare...




I want to learn the fine art of panning for autumn-gold
I want to try to taste more wonder than a heart can hold
I want to be tuned to the imminence of letting go
Because the winning way of farewell hides in each hello

I want to linger longer in a leaf-lit afternoon
To steep senses in flickers of woodland’s lofty festoon
To marvel at grand frescos etched on ceilings of thin air
Before time’s hand runs fingers through treetops silent and bare

I want to plan a dinner-date beneath fall’s canopy
Serenaded by minstrels tall and stately as can be
To discover the treasure in the fine measure of Now
And not postpone the pleasure of the fleeting autumn bough

I want to make the most of what no sleight of can tame
To try each flying live-learn-love, where Past has staked it claim
To take more precious time to pause where Was is always chief
Where winsome, winning ways of farewell fret in every leaf

© Janet Martin

I want to plan a dinner-date beneath fall’s canopy
Serenaded by minstrels tall and stately as can be...





Friday, October 13, 2023

Autumn Awe-Awareness



A few glimpses,
at what sends Autumn's awe-meter over the top...
Thank-you, Lord


Awareness is fine-tuned to how the wind is winnowing the bough
Of supple sigh and so we try to linger longer in the Now


We loiter under arbors where we look up-up to stare and stare
At nature’s oh-so-fine design of leaf-motifs on sheafs of air



We seek out orchard-bowers bent with harvest’s rosy remanent
And feel earth’s pull; intangible mingling of gladness and lament




We polish Reason’s silver spoon and see a picnic afternoon
Beckoning, so we smile and go to steep our souls in Autumn’s boon


Of sunrise and set snared aloft in little leaf-mirrors soon doffed
Of nature’s wreath lowered beneath footsteps that fall, muffled and soft



Of treetops shedding threads, red-gold; autumn’s raiment is hard to hold
Of hearts that break with delight’s ache, of winds that tug, sassy and bold




Of dawn, rushing yon eastward rim where mercy’s renewed favors brim
To frameless sweeps where nameless deeps flood earth with heaven’s worship hymn




To rekindle the simple thrill from pumpkins perched on porch and sill
Or leaves tossed wild to long-lost child that romps and runs from hill to hill

© Janet Martin














Saturday, October 29, 2022

Of Paling Autumn-tide...



Tucked between stunning sunrises and sunsets
a week of busy, beautiful autumn days and fall foliage farewells
whirled away...



Of senses steeped in heavens heaped with bottomless azure
Of hunger held where moments meld to moments like felled leaves
of awesome blaze of autumn days, no awed gaze can secure
of joy and grief as leaf-by-leaf earth gathers final sheaves

of happiness and loneliness in autumn’s madrigal
of dappled skies as lullabies are loosened from the limb
of mellow, yellow bliss in the felicity of fall
of landscapes glossed with leaves of frost as lofty tapers dim

of garnet, gold, and umber soldering of farewell’s kiss
of tattered music sheets scattered like fleets on leaf-tossed seas
of vain attempt to circumvent the haste of What Yet Is
of precious days soon blazoning a maze of memories

of hearts beguiled by art run wild in unrivaled release
of brooding blues and dazzling hues in myriad shades of red
of purple hills as morning spills its molten masterpiece
of worship’s woo as winds undo bronze buttons overhead

of pure delight footloose, in spite of ties that snare and bind
of heartstrings caught in every thought besotted by fall’s bow’r
of senses keened by tresses weaned, to what is soon behind
of season spent and reason bent with remnants of lent flow’r

of wisdom earned by lessons learned of what no one can stay
of now and here hinged to a sphere of ages out of reach
of you and I beneath a vault of sky, crowning today
of urge and whim soft burgeoning with what remains to teach

of ‘love-you-so’ and letting go and ‘oh-don’t-leave-me-yet’
of weathering the tethering of dusk-bathed countryside
of cherishing the precious perishing leaf-pirouette
of ships that sail upon a vale of paling autumn-tide

of glint and glance of dizzy dance of leaves across the yard
of taking stock of tick and tock’s inevitable claim
of shadows thinned by a cold wind raking a boulevard
of wooden wicks like candlesticks snuffed of life’s little flame

of scarves of smoke draped on an ochre ambience of death
of days undone by ways common to man since Time was spun
of a rag quilt, pieced, stitched and spilt with every sacred breath
of silver ilk, like milkweed silk snagged on a ray of sun

© Janet Martin