Life's Finest Work of Art

PAD Challenge day 8-For today’s Two-for-Tuesday prompt:

Write a form poem, and/or...

Write an anti-form poem.

Form: Shakespearean sonnet

This poem was inspired by the driver of this truck

that pulled over and offered a regular biker to his job, a ride

on this clear, cold, crisp morning!

The biker accepted😊💓

(nothing sets a sweeter tone for the day than acts of kindness)

a smile is a gift anyone can give

a helping hand, life's finest work of art

beauty is found, no matter where we live

if kindness is the first-fruit of the heart 

although no hall of fame or gallery

will showcase, what some may call commonplace

no one can leave a finer legacy

than that of love, humility and grace

no name in lights, no wild applauding cheers

for this is not love's mission or its quest

but to mingle laughter and prayers and tears

and thus become the blessing and the blessed

today, oh, what a perfect place to start

to make another Finest Work of Art

Janet Martin

Colossians 3:17
And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, 

do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, 

giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

    

Adapting to November (both literally and metaphorically;)

 

Nov. .PAD Challenge Day 7. For today's prompt, write an adaptation poem.

I've been drinking in the beauty of leaf song lately!

A weekend of wild winds has winnowed its remnant woo💝

Once more the dirge from leafless limbs through barren belfies peals

Summer and autumn’s harvest hymns of fruit and flower shucked

The gardener admires nature’s ardor as it seals

Its promise with a kiss of seeds ‘neath umber furrows tucked

The blush that once bore roses wears the hasting death of day

Desire turns the other cheek and bears dusk’s dogged woo

For nothing in the world can keep time's westward tug at bay

Darling, to keep believing is the best that we can do

Denial is a futile antidote to steadfast truth

Once more the dirge of leafless hymns ignites a ballad, blue

As cornflowers pressed into sky, or eyes of wizened youth

For all that yet remains to try the sighs of me and you

Once more we brave the welkin trace of fingers without form

And will smiles to our faces while the dirge of autumn plays

A breath stealing ensemble that soon takes the world by storm

As stars and diamonds tremble on the prow of winter days

...that cannot faze the hand of He from whom all mercies flow

That cannot thwart the Deity from whence each season brims

That cannot vex the Giver or His grace whereby we go

Aha, Time's timbers quiver with hope's joy in leafless hymns

© Janet Martin

Compilation of Adaptation

Nov. .PAD Challenge Day 7. For today's prompt, write an adaptation poem.

(This challenge completely slipped my mind this year, until this weekend!)

Happy Monday!

Here's to another page in life's compilation of adaptation,

(a work in constant progress)

We live in a world of whether-change!

Some whethers are like warm and friendly hosts,

others like unwelcome guests!

Forge on, my friend, by the grace of God

He crowns the broken with His beauty!

(like last night's sunset!)

To days gone by none can return

Nor ask for a preview

Of adaptations yet to learn

Where days to years run through

...a flue of love and life run rife

With hellos and goodbyes

No fitting rooms to choose its strife

Or try it on for size

...where it has always been like this

As days to years run through

We learn to adapt to what is

What more, pray, can we do?

...but make the best of what we hold

Lest, in lament we miss

The treasure made of moment-gold

The pleasure in the kiss

The melody twixt Yet and Was

Of holding and release

As Adaptations of Because

Create a masterpiece

While a medley of revisions

With days to years comprise

Adaptation's compilations

Of growing old and wise

The vanity of This and That

Soon slip-slip-slips away

Yet always a fresh welcome mat

Meets us at break of day

..and bids us up and onward through

Adaptation's bequest

While softly days to years undo

The buttons on Soul's vest

With fingers deft and dogged, oh

And whispers that beguile

Beseeching farewells with hello

And teaching tears to smile

Janet Martin

 

Bless the LORD, O my soul!

O LORD my God, You are very great;

You are clothed with splendor and majesty.

2He wraps Himself in light as with a garment;

He stretches out the heavens like a tent,

3laying the beams of His chambers

in the waters above,

making the clouds His chariot,

walking on the wings of the wind...

Psalm 104:1-3

(read the whole spectacular chapter here) 

Earth Always Responds...(to the tender touch of Father Time)

PAD Challenge day 25: For today's prompt, write a response poem.

Song of Solomon 2: 10-13 (BSB)

My beloved calls to me,

“Arise, my darling.

Come away with me, my beautiful one.

For now the winter is past;

the rain is over and gone.

The flowers have appeared in the countryside;

the season of singingc has come,

and the cooing of turtledoves

is heard in our land.

The fig tree ripens its figs;

the blossoming vines spread their fragrance.

Arise, come away, my darling;

come away with me, my beautiful one.”

Earth starts to shed its dormant hues, where nature’s gaberdine

Of brown and gray is woven through with threads of verdant green...

Upon a loom we cannot see we sense its shuttles hum

To trim the limb of barren tree with hints of more to come...

Earth starts to shed its dormant hues, where nature’s gaberdine

Of brown and gray is woven through with threads of verdant green

Upon a loom we cannot see we sense its shuttles hum

To trim the limb of barren tree with hints of more to come

Soon still bedraggled sweeps will beam, where warmer winds caress

Earth’s weathered countenance will gleam with Mercy’s promises

The canvas where spent generations toiled and tilled remains

(We too must bear the castigation Adam’s curse sustains)

How often we begin to think that springtime is amiss

Only to be rebuffed with pink petal-confetti’s kiss

Only to be awestruck anew by ways we cannot change

On an established avenue that none can rearrange

The Maker of heaven and earth keeps every vow He makes

He tunes time’s tethered tide where birth and death’s season-surf breaks

Across the rise and fall of hill and dell His fervor spills

Merlot bud-beakers pulse and swell with favor He instills

Annual metamorphoses-es always steal the show

An unplumbed vault of happiness-es bound to overflow

Where vistas, still silence-immersed in April’s spartan scrim

Are like an orchestra about to burst into full hymn

Earth always responds to the tender touch of Father Time

She blushes as a rush of splendor rises to her clime

As monotones of brown and gray give way to green and gold

And color-worlds about to play May’s wonders to behold

© Janet Martin

Annual metamorphoses-es always steal the show...

An unplumbed vault of happiness-es bound to overflow...

Blissful Ignorance

PAD challenge day 22: For today's prompt, write an organism poem.

There is a scientific explanation for all the wonders of creation!

While I don't condone stupidity 

I do see some merit in blissful ignorance😅

and simply reveling in the beholding/listening.

I will thrill to trills and warbles of spring's feathered orchestra...

I am blissfully ecstatic without the wherefore and why

Of the stunning, unprolific declarations of the sky...

I prefer the panoramic pages of dusk's countryside...

You may keep your scientific, staid specifics if you please

I am quite content to linger beneath music in the trees

I will thrill to trills and warbles of spring's feathered orchestra

Rather than drills about mating and territorial blah-blah

I am blissfully ecstatic without the wherefore and why

Of the stunning, unprolific declarations of the sky

Hail to all scholastic sages, to all valedictorian pride

I prefer the panoramic pages of dusk's countryside

You may muse and mull, sweet scholar, over microscopic tracts

I am quite content to marvel without knowing all the facts...

God bless all the scientific geniuses for their gift

I am quite content to lie beneath the sky where cloud-ships drift

Janet😊

The Secret to A Heart Content

Day 20 PAD Challenge: For today's prompt, write a six words-challenge poem.

6 words are: Content, Double, Guide, Meet, Pump, Suit

Red-bellied Woodpecker

(he showed up today, after a long absence looking a bit harried, but still beautiful!)

American Robin

How lovely is a heart content

How double-happy its delight

When we meet life, not with lament

But with poetic/ecstatic appetite 

Time is a tour guide, quite gallant

Poised to accommodate pursuit 

The heart is easy to enchant

When contentment has taken root 

A heart content cannot be bought

No pump can run its wellspring dry

Its happiness cannot be caught

Like a bird or a butterfly

I think sometimes we tend to miss

 Its kiss, and complicate its 'yes'

When contentment is simply this;

A heart chock-full of thankfulness 

P-s-s-s-t! keep this between you and me

I don't want to make Them feel bad

But, some folk don't read poetry

Then wonder why they feel so sad

😅

Janet Martin

Some people don't read poetry or bird-watch!

poor dears😉😊

We, The Up and Comers (to the Sunset Years)

PAD challenge day 18-For today's prompt, write a We Blank poem.

Heb.2:1

Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard,

lest at any time we should let them slip...

This poem is written from a middle of middle age vantage point...

Gorgeous sunset the other evening but no freedom to wax poetic just then...

We tend to feel a bit like trees

Weathered and buffeted and tossed...

We tend to find as time goes by

And insolence of youth relents/repents

That the voice of choice will reply

Without a doubt, with consequence

We tend to learn as years accrue

Beneath the sparkle of the splash

The vault of ‘What I Thought I Knew’

Is quite depleted of its stash

We tend to feel a bit like trees

Weathered and buffeted and tossed

By winds of wild epiphanies

And olden ways to progress lost 

Then we tend to muzzle bold boasts

Attuned to time’s fading applause

We tend to raise much meeker toasts

To wisdom’s blunder-riddled cause

We tend to taste its grain of salt

In stumble-humbled middle-age

With empathy, rather than fault

Those struggling on a hard-knock page

Beneath the tutelage of Time

We tend to learn as we advance

There is so much more to life’s climb

Than can be appraised at a glance

…and how too oft we disregard

The common ground beneath our feet

How everyone’s ‘uphill’ is hard

And love lives, not on Easy Street

We of a more middle-age class

Chastened and jarred by season-swirls

Sense a Baton we soon must pass

To up and coming boys and girls

Beneath the sovereignty of clocks

We tend to be startled to find

How swift the classroom door unlocks

To students, never far behind

Thus, we should attend above all

What we tend often to forget

The aftermath of the footfall

Weaves someone’s path not travelled yet

© Janet Martin

So When Death's Solemn Shadows Fall

PAD challenge day 14: For today's prompt, write a scary poem.

Heb.10:26-31

The Just Live by Faith...

26For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth,

 there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,

  27but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, 

and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries.

  28Anyone who has rejected Moses’ law 

dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. 

29Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy 

who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, 

counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, 

and insulted the Spirit of grace? 

30For we know Him who said, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” [g]says the Lord.

 And again, “The Lord will judge His people.” 

31It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

Psalm 16:11

You will show me the path of life; 

In Your presence is fullness of joy; 

At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

Jesus Paid It All/Old Rugged Cross Medley by Anthem Lights

How holy swells the wellspring where Time’s finite fathoms toll

Each breath subtly unraveling the mantle ‘round the soul

How fragile is the fleeting glove of man’s mortality

Where He who wove us with His love instilled eternity

…so when this little life is through, if we believe in Him

Death will be but the doorway to the place where pleasures brim

As all our tears are wiped away forevermore by He

Who stepped from Heaven’s throne to pay sin’s debt in agony

So when Death’s solemn shadows fall no terror fills its wave

Unless, still we refuse to call on He, mighty to save

Unless because of unbelief, pride scorned the blood grace spilled

And wakes to the eternal grief of rejection fulfilled

To all He pleads, come unto Me, sin's sentence to atone  

Salvation for humanity is found in Christ alone

Where, Holy God's mercy unfolds another day of grace 

Until faith's fulfillment beholds the glory of His face 

How holy swells the spring where Love's infinite fathoms roll 

Each breath softly unraveling the glove that veils the goal  

Pray, when Death's solemn shadows fall beneath the Reaper's knife

Tis but the the Saviour's tender call to everlasting life

© Janet Martin

Isa.53:4-5

Surely He has borne our [g]griefs
And carried our [h]sorrows;
Yet we [i]esteemed Him stricken,
[j]Smitten by God, and afflicted.
5But He was wounded[k] for our transgressions,
He was [l]bruised for our iniquities;
The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,
And by His stripes[m] we are healed.

How To Know What Love Is...

Pad(poem-a-day) Challenge day 13:For today's prompt, write a How to blank poem

1 John 3:16-20

This is how we know what love is: 

Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.

 And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 

17 If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need

 but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? 

18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.

19 This is how we know that we belong to the truth 

and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence: 

20 If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, 

and he knows everything.

My Savior's Love- How Marvelous, How Wonderful

(version 1)

I Will Sing the Wondrous Story

When through ancient age/page we travel

When our hearts are wholly gripped

As we trace and humbly marvel

And embrace redemption’s script

As the grace that wrought salvation

Stuns us with love’s magnitude

Mercy’s divine transformation

Turns despair to gratitude

Draws the heart, no longer hardened

(Though this world with horrors groans)

To the cross where sin is pardoned

To the One whose death atones

All who come without excuses

All who repent and believe

Not one sinner, He refuses

His forgiveness to receive

Look! Behold Hope’s holy horror

At Love’s body, bathed in blood

At the Healer’s Hands, nail-burrowed

From Him spews redemption’s flood

Hark! He cries, by all forsaken

Behold! Now He bows His head

Look! He dies, the skies are shaken

As the graves give up their dead

But Death was a fated rival

I AM no grave could constrain

Jesus Christ arose triumphal

Over sin and death; amen

This is how we know what love is

Jesus Christ laid down his life

Love does not forget its promise

Wrought through Heaven's sacrifice

This is joy; to be forgiven

Love's broken body, life’s bread

Where, still through all earth from Heaven

Runs redemption’s scarlet thread

This is hope’s unflinching anchor

Though time’s troubled tempests roll

Hallelujah what a Savior

This is faith that makes us whole

Hallelujah, what a Savior

Jesus, Savior of the soul

© Janet Martin

But By The Grace of God (til death doth part)

Poem-a-day challenge day 12:write a counting poem and/or not counting poem.

Not counting all the times, we didn’t see quite eye to eye

When your druthers and mine were like December meets July

When opposites that once seemed so attractive start to irk

As we reevaluate what it takes to make ‘us’ work

Not counting all the days when love's 'tone' was misunderstood

And we did not respond in ways like two grown adults should

When we behaved like rivals rather than husband and wife

I’d say we are exceptional at rocking married life

Not counting all the rules that unschooled mid-life love ignores

Until our tempers cool, no longer fooled by lion-roars/'winning' scores

I’d say in spite of all the times we bite instead of kiss

That you and I are prime examples of sweet, wedded bliss

I hope that life becomes a 'losing track of years' because

Of moment-thrum's momentous sums; the love-story of 'us'

Where, in spite of those times we blush some sad excuse to fend

We'll look back on a life of 'us'; love, faithful to the end

© Janet Martin

April Aria

Poem-a-day challenge day 12:write a counting poem and/or not counting poem.

Thy fronds that spill in daffodil...

Last year the daffodils were in full bloom...

this year's much cooler April has mustered a few brave shoots

thy ponds, a turquoise jewel

Ah, let me count the ways I love thee, April afternoon

Thy undulating clouds above me, earth's bestirring boon...

(Sunday afternoon showcased a strange ring around the sun)

Ah, let me count the ways I love thee, April afternoon

Thy undulating clouds above me, earth's bestirring boon

Where bulb and bud and muddy garden fuel flower-dreams

With autographs of winter's pardon bursting at thy seams

Goldfinch, a dapper fellow in his new yellow physique 

Thy warmer windsong tuning willow-cellos by the creek

And laughter, glorious laughter after winter wends away 

Ripples to heaven's rafter with a happy hip-hooray

Thy blue and bronze, thy timid green, thy moody ebb and flow

Like love, when it is torn between holding and letting go 

Like life, where though sunshine is sweet a little rain must fall

Like ten-thousand tap-dancer's feet at earth's coming-out ball 

Thy newborn lamb, thy cooing dove, thy wooing wink and grin 

Ah, let me count the ways I love the way you kiss my skin

And let me leave my sweater on the chair beside my book

While you and I together wander by the winding brook 

...to look for mint and marigold emerging in the silt 

To watch Mother Nature unfold earth's blanket like a quilt

To listen to the swishing of her brisk and busy broom

Teasing the people fishing beneath thy leaf-threaded loom

Ah, let me count the ways that thrill; thy temp'ramental duel  

Thy fronds that spill in daffodil, thy ponds, a turquoise jewel

Thy orchestras that trill and fill dawn's dark with joy renewed

The way you stay the course until winter's chill is subdued

 

Thy sense of baited breath before the curtain-rise; the cheers

That thunder where we waited; from death's guise life reappears 

Thy mission undeterred by Old Man Winter's farewell flings

I love the way the heart is stirred; hope sings and sings and sings 

   © Janet Martin

Poem-Power

 Todays poem-a-day challenge is to write a power poem...

I would be remiss to ignore this; Poem Power💖

I bemoaned the fact the other day that I have more poem books

full of breath-taking poetry than I have life left to read them all,

(unless that was all I did) 

which would leave too many other beautiful loves unattended to💗💖💕

I'm reveling in Edith Holden's beautiful books these days...

A true treasure chest of art, prose and poetry!

Poem-power

It plants a pretty garden where a blank page used to be

A bit of unkempt ink can tango with a memory

And turn what would be nothing but a thought into an ache

That turns into a poem that turns into a keepsake

Its seeps through creases where other ink pieces do not fit

It turns a body inside out yet doesn’t show a bit

It sparkles like a diamond on the backdrop of a sigh

A patchwork quilt of afternoons that dangle from the sky

A poem moans like breakers on the shoreline of the heart

It gathers scattered shells and melds them into works of art

A wisp of you and I entwined through twist and tug of rhyme

Becomes a token that withstands unspoken tests of time

The power of a poem wields a wild and wondrous force

Of cheek to cheek slow-dancing, of love’s touchless intercourse

Where centuries and worlds apart still kindred spirits meet

To trace the fault-lines of a heart with kisses bittersweet

It sweeps soft as a feather across paper ballroom floors

A tender ink-stained tether woven by lost troubadours

Who set the stage for we who race to chase through far-flung gates

A lure tossed into pure unsullied deeps of what yet waits

A poem-memento is unlike any other prize

It scales the heights of passion for the freefall of goodbyes

It flirts with hurt if but to taste the salty sting of years

In wounds beneath the skin that Poem washes with its tears

© Janet Martin

a few more poem treasure-trunks

Road to Glory...

'For me, my identity isn't a golf score'

"God made me good at golf and

I want to glorify him with this gift"

Scottie Scheffler

“God is in control and the Lord is leading me, 

and if today is my time, then it’s my time, 

and if I shot 82 today, somehow I was going to use it for His glory."

Scottie Scheffler-Masters winner 2022

a few favorite moments...(proud wife)

...and caddy

savoring the sweetness of the moment 

and the support of many fans and family

In the writer's digest poem-a-day challenge

Yesterday's Prompt was write a taste poem

Today's prompt, is write a power poem.

This poem could be entitled 

The Power of Perseverance or

The Sweet Taste of Success

This poem could be about a private, personal challenge or

The fight to faith's finish-line!

So I settled on the title 

Road to Glory

Because the glorious sweetness of success's trophy always casts a shadow;

the bitter cup of dreams dashed (for now)

Cameron Smith acknowledges appreciative applause from fans

after a disappointing finish...

This poem was written with him in mind as well

as well as all of us who

have tasted, in varying degrees, 

the bitter draught of disappointment!

The pleasing flavours/favours of success

Somehow become more sweet

When hope’s hurdles to happiness

Have been honed by defeat

Sometimes we win, sometimes we lose

Life’s course of ups and downs

Refines endurance with its dues

Of crosses before crowns

The hard knocks of ‘not yet’ beget

If we do not give up

After the challenge has been met

The sweetest victor’s cup

Defeat is not the finished fight

But just a stepping-stone

To test the mettle of the might

Of more than skin and bone

Sometimes what at first glance may seem

Like failure and regret

Is but the beauty of a dream

Not quite accomplished yet

Then keep the faith; this is the rite

Before we realize

Where what once seemed a bitter fight

Was sweetening the Prize

© Janet Martin

Shout out to Corey Connors (a former local)

 from proud Canadian fans!

Eric Liddell, when being reprimanded by his sister 

for neglecting his responsibilities before God 

as he devoted his focus toward competitive running, responded,

 “I believe that God made me for a purpose. 

But He also made me fast, and when I run, I feel His pleasure .”

In whatever form it takes

May we all 'run' to feel God's pleasure!

So someday we may exclaim triumphantly

2 Tim.4:7-8

I have fought a good fight,

I have finished my course, 

I have kept the faith:

 Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, 

which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day:

 and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.