Un-common Wealth on Common Ground

 We all growl like bears;
    we moan mournfully like doves.

Isa. 59:11

Who can one’s worth or wisdom prove?

Or life’s full fortune count

The giver and the taker, love

Supplied by the same fount

Allowances of day to day

Provide a common wealth

God first gives what He takes away

Man owns nothing himself

…but owes his very breath to He

Whose grant we supplicate

And offer up Want’s frantic plea

That often bids us wait

…as Mercy drips like a fresh peach

From chins of much demand

Where both giver and taker reach

Into the selfsame Hand

For what we give He gives us first

God holds the spoon we lick

Where we would all be misers, cursed

With love of purse and brick

But for kind pricks and kicks to wake

Us to the mouth we feed

Ah, both giver and taker break

A loaf of common need

...and therefore have one common boast

No pompous look-at-me

For giver-taker’s least and most

Is simply what we see

The Hand that cups the sands of time

And all its peopled noise

Gives giver and taker the clime

Of living’s sorrow-joys

© Janet Martin


Thinking of all you Iowa-ans digging out of a blizzard...
(how do I know? Hubby is headed that way with a load of pigs needing unloading today
but he was told last night they have three days of digging out to do!!)
H-m-m-m!

sidenote: Jim just called (afternoon) Pigs delivered.
...and he said, the pigs look better than he does! lol!

Our precip came in rain and rain and MORE rain!!!

There's something about a rainy day that finds its way to a poet's pen
a musician's melody,
and a day-dreamer's dancing-feet,
so it seems...

Singin' in the Rain Gene Kelly 

Hold To The Hand...a repost

For I am the LORD your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, 

Do not fear; I will help you. 

Isa.41:13

Hold to the hand that holds the sand that trickles through time’s glass

The Keeper of His promises knows what will come to pass

Then should the fight be hard and night reach far into the day

Still, hold the hand that holds us in each untold come-what-may

Hold to the hand that holds the land and sea in folds of blue

He parts the waters of the deep so that we may pass through

And should the way that he allows seem foreign to our want

Still, hold the hand that holds us close where fear and worry taunt

Hold to the hand that will not fail though oft it seems, we must

Yet, if we never failed then would we ever truly trust?

His hands are rich with mercy, granting courage for this strife

Hold to the hand that holds us in the gray and gold of life

Hold to the hand that holds the plans for every one of us

And wore the nails and bore the cross for our sin; Jesus

Hold to His hand, He understands what we can never know

Hold to the hand that holds us near and never lets us go

© Janet Martin

rerun time:) 

6 kiddos coming today, two in a few minutes so no writing time for now:)

Hope we all have a  hold-to-His-Hand kind of day!

God Bless.

As Lu// God Would Have It

Catching up on prompts for the poem-a-day challenge:) Busy weekend.
 Day 11: For today’s prompt, write an unlucky poem. 

Whether you believe in luck or not, 

you can still write a poem about a situation that others might deem unlucky.

"Oh, lucky you", we sigh, 

moved by the bit 

that eyes behold

While skin can veil a world of scarred

halls marked

with stories 

never told

Unlucky you, we wail

moved by the

scale of circumstance

Still, always at the

mercy of

Love's Blessing-laden

nail-scarred Hands

Janet~

As Luck God Would Have It

If We Could See

If we could see the hand that cups

The way we walk, our fears would fade

If we upon our shoulder touched

The Touch of He whose Hand is stayed

If we with naked eye could trace

The Presence of Essence we trust

How holy-wholly we'd embrace

The nail scarred hands that hold our dust

If for one breath, faith would allow

A glimpse of mercy’s Majesty

Then we, without a doubt would bow

Beneath the hand we cannot see

© Janet Martin

 My times are in Your hand; Psalm 31:15

Glimpse

The last star fades on paling deep

Time’s tide of days expands its cast

The sky is like a coral mast

Affixed to silver-misted sweep

From eastern brim Someone sets free

A heaven-hymn of peach and pinks

Where sailors of Time’s tempests glimpse

The Keeper of both man and sea

© Janet Martin

Mercy's Magnum Opus- God's Hope For Us

Ontario hydro bills to rise 42% in 5 years

It would be easy to peer anxiously into the doom-and-gloom fore-casted future...

(I was just listening to some feeble suggestions on how Ontario-ans can save on ever sky-rocketing electricity costs! We have conserved!!!...so well in fact, that 'They...the Hydro-One-lords' promise to increase electricity costs for the next five years )

So, I turn back the furnace, put on a sweater, keep an eye on the clock to plan my day around peak-energy rates, and look at the birds of the air...)

Despair will blind us to God’s kindness and hope’s fellowship

Life, at best unpredictable, offers no guarantees

Save this, a faithful hand to hold where else our feet would slip

Into the bog of fear and foggy what-ifs and maybes

Unbelief chooses action through the eyes of ignorance

The cost of ignorance breaks more than budget-balanced deeds

The earth groans in the aftermath of greed’s indifference

Where man has long-forsaken Thou Shalt Not for lesser creeds

Despair gapes like a hollow waiting to swallow its prey

And oh, it could and would save for One greater than our fear

Mercy’s Magnum Opus purchased redemption for always

And if we call on Him He never turns a deafened ear

Ah, here the crux of hope is grounded; faith’s foundation sure

In spite of amassed unbelief His promises prevail

Oh, He will never leave or forsake us; Hope is secure

For they who cling to He whose law of love will never fail

© Janet Martin

Scholars far and wide at last have their long-awaited for...SNOW-DAY!!!