Showing posts with label anniversary poem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anniversary poem. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 3, 2025

An Anniversary Celebration of Sonnets

 37 years...

Thank-you, Lord

 

This photo was taken at my niece's wedding on May 24th,
where we gathered to witness the marriage and celebrate
Newlyweds, 
who were sparkling with visions of marital bliss 
dancing in their heads!
All of us who have been married for
well, really, almost any amount of time know
'till death doth part' takes more than we can successfully
and beautifully accomplish on our own!
But with God nothing is impossible!
Especially faithful love,
which He is the Author of! 

Below is Jim's 'home away from home'
contributing often to the successes and challenges 
of marriage and love's second miles
(pun intended 😅💓 )




He left yesterday morning with plans of picking up a load out west!
On Sunday night after returning home from a family reunion
I cooked and baked a week's worth of supplies
Last night the load got cancelled 😒
He will be returning home tonight if all goes as planned.
And such is life

***

So much of life is out of our hands
But never love; love helps us bear all things
Not with determined and selfish demands
But with the strength that self-surrender brings 

Love, a story that begins in the heart
 Soon finds its feet as blindness starts to see
To pull together lest we drift apart
Takes sacrificing 'I' for 'us' and 'we'

Love never runs out of lessons to teach
No one can outlive its so-much-to-learn 
Then, before one of us is out of reach
Let's make the most of each day's no-return 

Before the solemn sundering of ties
Forever closes doors and lips and eyes 

© Janet Martin

***

1 Cor.13:4-8  (NKJV)
Love suffers long and is kind; 
love does not envy; 
love does not parade itself,
 is not [a]puffed up;
 5 does not behave rudely, 
does not seek its own,
 is not provoked, 
[b]thinks no evil; 
6 does not rejoice in iniquity, 
but rejoices in the truth; 
7 bears all things, 
believes all things, 
hopes all things, 
endures all things.
8 Love never fails...

Darling, in a world mad with lust and spite
Let's make a vow to guard against the trend 
Committing rather to fight love's good fight  
By God's grace to be faithful to the end 

Darling, the world will never sympathize
With altars filled with ash of sacrifice 
Love suffers long and is kind; what a prize
True love esteems the other; what a price 

Darling, to-have-and-hold is no small fete 
To love-and-cherish until death doth part
Is not a vacation on Easy Street
Nor an endeavor for the faint of heart

Darling, let's give love every finest chance
And live life humbly, by the grace God grants

© Janet Martin

Eccles.4:12
... and a three strand cord is not quickly broken.

Armed with a world of wonderful advice
Is not enough to master love's success
Until we learn love's law of sacrifice
Marriage will suffer much unhappiness 

Fond hopes and dreams are lovely to behold 
But life does not cater to Well-laid Plan 
Its highway does not flawlessly unfold
According to the want and wish of man 

The ups and downs of love and life are sure
Marriage takes two people, humanly-flawed
And binds them with ties able to endure
If woven with the third strand who is God

Darling, let's pray through both life's grand and grim 
That our love reflects the love of Him

© Janet Martin

And last but not least, 
after many somber reminders this past year+
through many sudden losses of  Husband or Wife of
neighbours, friends and family,
 a sonnet of solemn awareness/thankfulness...

***

No one can see or guarantee Tonight 
Death often enters/visits where/when we least expect
Sobering us with meek, wiser insight;
Love, both a charge and gift none should neglect 

Each day pulses with opportunity
To love each other better, and God first 
To make the most of little words like 'we'
And weather faithfully life's best and worst 

So when death comes (and it most surely will)
Our deepest sorrow will not be regret
But, as the bitter tears of parting spill
We praise God for the joy of love's vows kept 
 
Darling, while time is still on our side
Let's try our best to live love Self-denied 

© Janet Martin






Lyrics-Dorothy F. Gurney

1 O perfect Love, all human thought transcending,
lowly we kneel in prayer before thy throne,
that theirs may be the love which knows no ending,
whom thou in sacred vow dost join in one.

2 O perfect Life, be thou their full assurance
of tender charity and steadfast faith,
of patient hope and quiet, brave endurance,
with childlike trust that fears no pain or death.

3 Grant them the joy which brightens earthly sorrow;
grant them the peace which calms all earthly strife;
grant them the vision of the glorious morrow
that will reveal eternal love and life.


Psalter Hymnal, 1987

Monday, June 3, 2024

Love, Far More Than It Appears...

Jim and I are celebrating 36 years of wedded bliss today!
Some days more blissful than others, for such is love and life...



It may appear quite commonplace; The love between husband and wife
As, for better or worse, we face/brace and share the highs and lows of life
Where workaday and give-and-take and find-a-way to get along
Is not always a piece of cake to keep love patient, kind and strong

Love, as it weathers smiles and tears of ‘what God joins till death doth part’
Is always more than it appears, and never for the faint of heart
For no matter how old or young or very much in love we are
Sometimes we do not bite our tongue, sometimes diff’ring opinions spar

Love is life’s very complex Best; so bitter-sweet, so wonder-full,
So rife with changes bound to test perspective with its push and pull
But, pray we tenderly revere Now-and-Here’s opportunity
For no one knows how far or near till farewell’s somber certainty

How graciously God’s goodness grants fresh chances as we live and learn
For every single circumstance love guarantees a rich return
And, though it may look commonplace, love is far more than it appears
It is a gift that, by God’s grace, grows dearer with the passing years

Heart throb, heartbreak; the stakes of love are very sacred and severe 
The pinnacle of perfect joy and tender trove of grief-borne tear 
Where we can never tell what waits to try the waning ties that bind
Around God's fingers as the days and years softly, surely unwind 

How often, unexpectedly, Death reaches in to claim its prey
How often then, more reverently we vow to treasure every day
And cherish the familiar face of still-present husband or wife
And prize what appears commonplace, but is the very best of life

A wedding anniversary is never commonplace, my dear 
It is the evidence that 'we' have weathered one more God-lent year
It is a celebration of the highs and lows love has withstood
Not by ourselves, but by the love of God who is faithful and good 

© Janet Martin

Yes, Love often appears quite commonplace... whether it's
Hubby's hearty swig from Wife's morning coffee
(because its the perfect temperature!)
or,
Hubby's 'toss his hat whither-so-ever it lands' except the hooks inside the door,
quite indifferent to Wife's 'evil eye' 😛😂😅




...and SO many things that Wife does and drives Husband batty,
Long stories, too many bunny trails, 😅
(but I've wondered why he cares when it clearly seems he often
  isn't listening in the first place) 😂

Always poetry waiting to be written...

Forgetting to pay bills on time...OOPS!! 
Ain't love grand?!!

7‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother 
and be united to his wife,c
8and the two will become one flesh.’d 
So they are no longer two, but one flesh. 
9Therefore what God has joined together, 
let man not separate.”

Thursday, October 12, 2023

Marriage (Is a Lifelong Unfolding)


It's really hard to believe that it's ten years!
Happy 10th Anniversary! 
May God bless you with many more happy, faithful years of marriage!

10 years later...
(photo credit to a photographer in Nova Scotia)



Everyone who is married knows 
that although wedding celebrations and congratulations are very special, 
Anniversary congratulations are ever-the-more so,
 having experienced, by the grace of God what it takes to fulfill marriage vows,
(especially as parenting-challenges are added🙏💝😍)



Marriage is a lifelong learning 
about highs and lows of love
A lifetime of no returning 
to a world of ‘I’ and ‘me
From the moment vows are spoken 
and recorded up above
Only by death’s parting broken, 
marriage is a life of ‘we

Marriage, is God’s holy knitting 
together of two to one
A lifetime of recommitting 
to be each other’s best friend
For this is no small endeavor, 
on a Wedding Day begun
Because marriage is forever; 
love, a student to the end

Marriage is full of surprises; 
'no dreamer’s dream long intact
Love’s politest of disguises 
soon faces reality
Testing Best of expectation
 with age-old matters of fact
Teaching stubborn indignation 
lessons in humility

Marriage is a bit like weather, 
some days full of smiles, sun-warm
Laughter finesses the tether 
that feels far too fine to break
But some days are dark with thunder, 
some days love must brave a storm
Some days love may dare to wonder 
if marriage was a mistake

But what God has joined together,
 by His grace He will sustain
Day by day, just like the weather, 
marriage weathers highs and lows
As love learns to say ‘I’m sorry’, 
faithful through both sun and rain
God is unfolding the glory 
of a very priceless Rose

© Janet Martin

Mark 10:9
Therefore what God has joined together,
 let no one separate.”

















Monday, September 25, 2023

Of Unbroken Marriage Vows

Today is my parent's 60th Wedding Anniversary...

On Saturday Mom and Dad, along with all children and spouses
enjoyed a day of celebration of God's goodness,
in the blessing of the milestone of 60 years of marriage!

And no, the waters have not always been calm and sun-sparkled!
They have weathered many a self-sacrificing storm.

Happy 60th Anniversary, Mom and Dad!
So thankful for you!



No beauty in the world compares to love that stands the test of time
A yoke weathered by creature cares through vows uttered in youth’s green prime
Where none, as God joins heart to heart, with love’s solemn ‘from this day forth’
Can know how far ‘till death doth part’ will undo Heaven’s best on earth

For, when love is patient and kind, and when it does not seek its own
There is nothing that we can find worth more (save faith’s sound Cornerstone)
To ground love’s house built on the Rock, an anchor for the storms we face
To help us in our walk and talk to be examples of God’s grace

For it is by His grace love bears and believes and endures all things
A Threefold Cord; nothing compares to the strength this awareness brings
Where, by the mystery of God two become one, till death doth part
Let not man put asunder what marriage vows have joined, heart to heart

For nothing in the world compares to love that withstands living’s test
A recompense of humble prayers, of lessons learned through forgiveness
To bring honor and glory to He who is a most faithful Friend
And helps Husband and Wife to be loving and faithful to the end

Dear Mom and Dad…

God, bless and keep, protect and guide you on this special day, and then
From this day forth may He provide love and faith’s sacred need, amen
Where, though much in this world is broken, may what time weathers and bows
By God’s grace be love’s faithful token of Unbroken Marriage Vows

© Janet Martin

Num.6:24-26

“The Lord bless you and keep you;
The Lord make His face shine upon you,

And be gracious to you;
 The Lord [a]lift up His countenance upon you,
And give you peace.” ’












Saturday, June 3, 2023

It's Not Fancy, Love's Commitment



Marriage; that 'till death do us part' commitment
...that 'what God has joined together let no one put asunder' undertaking
...that 'for better or worse' that's bound to try even the starriest eyes 
Marriage; that union no love is ever fully prepared for

Today Jim and I, by the grace of God
 celebrate 35 years of marriage


it's not fancy, love's commitment
keeping kindness on its toes
learning how to be more patient
rather than wield verbal blows
learning to weather together
what could well draw us apart
when differences strain the tether
that has knit us heart to heart 

it's not fancy, love in action
testing more than how one feels
 about the truth of attraction
after first love cools its heels
its a digging in together
so we do not drift apart
in our promise of 'forever'
love; not for the faint of heart

it's not fancy, love's meek glory
tempered by both smile and tear
it's as simple as 'I'm sorry'
**(it's as hard as this, my dear)
it's a bittersweet commitment
bringing out our worst and best
as we stick to the fulfillment
of  vows human natures test

it's not fancy, being faithful
being gentle, being strong
being unselfish and grateful
 helping each other along
following Jesus example
of a sacrificial life
it's not fancy, love's wonder-full
journey as husband and wife 

💖💖💖

Janet Martin

As life writes our love stories,
as years fall behind us so swiftly
faithful love of husband and wife reaps a harvest
so worth the effort.
and it's not fancy,
or glamourous,
(for by now we've both too often stumbled
and been soundly humbled) 
until all that is left to exclaim is
'thank-you God' for your faithfulness
making possible ours!
...and through it all we marvel at how love
doesn't look anything like we once envisioned, but the more beautiful
because of its weathering!

When we get to those seasons in marriage when we're sure it's not going to work,
it is vital we pray to God for His faithfulness to see us through,
to help us remain faithful to the vows we made before Him!
Nobody has a successful marriage because it is easy.
Faithfulness happens day by day...

the other day on Ann Voskamp's blog
this beautiful guest post!!


Psalm 25:4
(a good prayer for marriage)
Show me your way, O Lord,
teach me your path.

** and a genuine 'I'm sorry' is not
"I'm sorry that you feel that I should be sorry for something
that I feel I don't need to be sorry for!!"😅

One of my fav love songs!




Friday, June 3, 2022

Of Unrelenting Honor & By The Grace of God

Therefore, what God has joined together
let not man put asunder.
Mark 10:9

The above words grow more solemn as the years pass.
I've seen God tug the tie many times,
and I have seen man attempt to do it
leaving heartbreak harsher than
the sorrow of death in it's wake...

Today, but by God's grace
 Jim and I celebrate 34 years of marriage.
Because 'love is a many-splendored thing'
It's a two-poem celebration😅💕

Counting dating years we've been together for 40 roller-coaster years!
I'm playing a few of our favorite love songs today


 





Of Unrelenting Honor...

Of cares weathered together
Of vows highly esteemed
Of tests to ‘I do’s’ tether
In ways we never dreamed
Of constant, sacred learning
Of faithfulness, because
There can be no returning
To life the way it was

Of compassionate living
And in ire’s pricks and stings
Of merciful forgiving
Because love bears all things
Of being understanding
When we don’t understand
Not selfishly demanding
To force the other’s hand

Of praying without ceasing
To be humble in heart
For there is no releasing
This pledge ‘ till death do part’
To be best friends forever
And never say, ‘I’m done’
When Satan tries to sever
The cord that makes two, one

Of sharing pain and pleasure
Committed to love’s vows
Of treasuring the measure
Of all God’s grace allows
And, whatever betide us
Of hilltop or of vale
Of asking Him to guide us
So, love will never fail

Of critique left unspoken
Of unuttered lament
Lest blame becomes love’s token
Rather than compliment
Of choosing to be grateful
Of laughing till we cry
Of fighting to be faithful
Until God pulls the tie

Of unrelenting honor
For love is like a cup
That always needs another 
...self cannot fill it up 
Let's fill it with an ocean
And in its pouring prove
With beholden devotion 
The greatest of these; love

© Janet Martin




But By the Grace of God (till death do part)

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





Tuesday, April 12, 2022

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




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

Thursday, June 3, 2021

That's Marriage, Ladies and Gentlemen

 Celebrating thirty-three years of 'us'!
Photo credit: Brittany Ruppert
 

Just now...phone rings (9:30 p.m.)
Me; Hello?
Him; what are you doing? Why haven't you called yet?
Me; I'm trying to finish writing something for our thirty-third anniversary.
but WOW, it's really hard work at night with an old, tired head...
Him; oh good! I thought maybe you weren't going to do one this year!

Yes, he looks forward to seeing a daily blog-post even if he is not really a fan of poetry
(Jim, for those who don't know us is a truck-driver)
Knowing he appreciates it always helps to motivate me to at least try
 on days when it's really hard to squeeze it in...
(first stanza is inspired by a scene last Friday
and every. single. other. niece or nephew wedding. ever.!!!!)😅

We’re getting pretty good at it, he and I
I button his shirt while he fixes his tie
He steps into shoes I have placed at his feet
‘Getting ready for a wedding’ just hit repeat
Because for some reason there is always a delay
Come date-to-be-home-for-someone’s-wedding-day
He calls from the truck ‘run the water, dear
If you give me five minutes, we should be near-
Ly ready to go (wedding starts in ten)
That’s marriage, ladies and gentlemen

‘For better or worse’ no matter what shape or size
Something will shadow/shatter the stars in love’s eyes
Sooner or later, we are bound to find out
What marriage vows are really all about
After the honeymoon (or on it?) when patience is tried
When love startles us with its less polished side
When words are tested with mettle of will
When love seems lacking its fire and thrill
It’s time to make time for each other again
That’s marriage, ladies and gentlemen

This is forever, ‘till death do us part’
Where no one can sever what God joins in heart
For as we commit to be faithful and true
He ties a knot only He can undo
To love and to cherish, a most sacred oath
That takes the full faith and commitment of both
And trusting that what we will need, God will give
In keeping our promise as long as we live
As we renew love’s vows again and again
That’s marriage, ladies and gentlemen

© Janet Martin

I made the poster below when I was 16 or 17.
 (yeah, we were young 'uns when we started)
See our names down the side???😍

 

The Ten Commandments for Married Couples 
was given to us on our 10th Anniversary from my parents
















Wednesday, June 3, 2020

For Better or Worse...


 Thanking God for the privilege of being able 
to celebrate 32 years of marriage today, by His grace...
Part of what I love about Jim is his never-ending ability to make me laugh.
I think he was waiting for an anniversary post cause he just saw it and texted me this
"I look like a pylon"😂

For better or for worse; who knows what factors will unfold
To test and try the caliber of vows to have and hold
This life of highs and lows husband and wife must jointly meet
To weather together both woe and wonders bittersweet

Marriage is no band-wagon that we board and disembark
According to our whims and wants; it is till death doth part
So from the words ‘I do’ we ought to keep this thought in mind
To help us strive to be more unselfish, patient and kind

For better or for worse is not a curse or ball and chain
It is the grace of sharing both love's pleasure and its pain 
It is full of surprises after groom kisses the bride
After two become one and discover love's 'other side' 😉

Marriage is more than signatures on a certificate
Two become one and none on earth its bond can abrogate
For what the Lord has joined His Hand alone will disannul
Till death doth part is not for faint of heart or disloyal

Marriage is learning to forgive and give more than we take
It’s saying I am sorry and admitting a mistake
It’s meeting in the middle toward a mutual aim
It’s learning to adapt to change; nobody stays the same

Marriage; it takes two but is always happier with Three
Husband and wife, with God as the crowning Supremacy
Where pray, that day by day and year by year as vows are tried
Marriage reflects the love that Heaven’s Groom has for His Bride

© Janet Martin

 Sharing Jean Hersey's practical and timeless thoughts on marriage
from the book The Shape of a Year
(hope you can read it...I couldn't choose a favourite paragraph) 



Jim and I are both Don Williams fans...
choosing these today