Awakenings~

Happy new month, new week, new day!

Happy December!

Ps.118:24

This is the day the Lord has made;

We will rejoice and be glad in it.

A sense of what yet waits ignites

A tense awareness of insights

Rolling in an un-parted sea

Of uncharted periphery

Daybreak gleams like a pristine sash

Untrampled by Thought’s barefoot dash

Through keyholes, over holy ground

Not sullied by ink-jots unbound

Ink jots disclose, if but in part

The burning bush within the heart

An impressionist’s silhouette

Of a bower bursting with Yet

Dawn unfolds the prevailing hue

Of the old laden with the new;

A trembling generosity

Of frames to fill with what will be

***

Prov.4:23

Above all else, guard your heart,
    for everything you do flows from it.

Romans 11:29
For God’s gifts and His call are irrevocable.

Give diligence to truth and grace; to awe and choice because life’s race

Beats to a very sacred drum of calling and election’s sum

Give diligence to worship’s part and guard the chamber of the heart

For from it flows all that we seek; Be swift to hear and slow to speak

Give diligence to hope and love before mortality’s thin glove

Slips from the part that never dies; run as if to obtain the Prize

Give diligence to faith because beyond time’s trying wraith of gauze

Awaits the endless recompense of what/who we gave due diligence

***

Eccles.12:13

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: 

Fear God, and keep his commandments: 

for this is the whole duty of man.

Experience steals innocence; for better or for worse

It does not withhold elements of both blessing and curse

Regardless of the circumstance that vexes you and I

Experience is bound to grant a lesson in reply

Foolish to wish for yester-cake or ‘Before’ ignorance

The ups and downs of give and take produce experience

No one can outlive its demands or dodge its dogged reach

The long arm of Experience always has much to teach

It drills us in the pros and cons of gaining older age

Is no respecter of persons; tutor of fool and sage

It builds character or destroys; tyrant and troubadour

Through bitter grief it renders joys we never knew before

Janet Martin

Of Pains and Gains...

 A weekend full of stressful oh-nos and happy-yeses...

oh the pains whereby we gain experience!

What will today bring; no one knows

but this...the unfailing grace whereby man goes.

Hallelujah!

Now break of day strums strings of gray and wakens hymns of blush and gold

Where what has not yet come our way will soon turn into days of old

Once more to man time is deployed in breath by breath spans, mercy-fired

Life grants so much to be enjoyed and yet leaves much to be desired

The pain that gains experience oft-times does not explain its whys

The rugged road to recompense is filled with hills of sundry size

They keep us on our toes and knees while pressing upward, left-foot-right

A winsome Thing that comes and goes where thorn and rose pricks and delights

Life’s bumps and blows seem to expose the simpler, sweeter joys and such

The somber tones the Painter chose (we never would) highlights His touch

And when we look back on the track we thought begot an unfair score

We start to see with clarity so much more to be thankful for

© Janet Martin

 From the ends of the earth I call to you, 

I call as my heart grows faint; lead me to the rock that is higher than I.

Psalm 61:2

To We Who Were Undaunted...

  Love must be sincere....

 ...Be devoted to one another in love

Romans 12:9-10
 

To we who were undaunted
by the touch of Time until Her proof pressed into faces
places we can no longer deny and the means to the end
begins to tenderly instill the import of the echo and the imprint of the sigh.

To we who took our turn
among the less accountable but soon outgrew its shoes, to be the teacher, not the tot;
we ought to take to heart the Holy Inevitable and focus on the part that is
 rather than what-is-not

To we well over halfway marks
like man’s three-score and ten (or by reason of added strength the length of fourscore years)
Pray we have learned to love before the tree is hard to bend and the branch seems too brittle
 to soften with tears

To we who have lived long enough
to join the age-old rue that things are not the simpler, sounder way they used to be
 are we who witness Caution's Admonitions coming true, and bear the brunt of wisdom
with surprised humility

To we who seem too old to change
our very seasoned ways (save by the grace of He who doth with mighty Mercy move)
To we who now are daunted by man’s brevity of days. ..let’s take what yet remains of Time and
 turn it into love

© Janet Martin

or the traditional format if preferred...

To we who were undaunted by the touch of Time until

 Her proof pressed into faces places we can no longer deny

and the means to the end begins to tenderly instill

the import of the echo and the imprint of the sigh.

To we who took our turn among the less accountable

but soon outgrew its shoes, to be the teacher, not the tot;

we ought to take to heart the Holy Inevitable

 and focus on the part that is rather than what-is-not

To we well over halfway marks like man’s three-score and ten

 (or by reason of added strength the length of fourscore years)

 Pray we have learned to love before the tree is hard to bend

and the branch seems too brittle to soften with tears

To we who have lived long enough to join the age-old rue

 that things are not the simpler, sounder way they used to be

are we who witness Caution's Admonitions coming true,

 and bear the brunt of wisdom with surprised humility

To we who seem too old to change our very seasoned ways

(save by the grace of He who doth with mighty Mercy move)

To we who now are daunted by man’s brevity of days. ..

let’s take what yet remains of Time and turn it into love

© Janet Martin

Because Of How Little We Know...

Books filled with knowledge tell us only so much

Life’s day-to-day college hinged to time’s cooled touch

Where retrospect’s cast can put on quite a show

And re-impact us with how little we know

…where we, well-acquainted with years full of ‘learn’

Depend on hindsight for the wisdom we earn

Trip-slip, fumble-stumble yields experience

Teaching us to live-love with more reverence/patience

…and not take for granted that we will behold

The seeds that we planted turn from green to gold

And always remember, by God’s grace we go

Then trust Him because of how little we know

© Janet Martin

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;

  in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.

Prov.3:5-6

A re-run because its message is needful every day!

Not The Same...(as being there)

 Imagination, as fine as it's flight is, 

Cannot transport us by pictures or fact

No matter how well we tell it or write it

Thought grasps but glimpses of full impact!

And we'll never be able to understand or care

As fully as those who can say "I've been there"

(This applies to traveling on a trip or traveling through ups and downs of life!)

Oh, you tell me it was lovely

Rave of moments fine and fair

But the truth is, there is nothing

Quite the same as being there

We are like a band of pilgrims

On time’s seasoned thoroughfare

Always looking through a window

Filled with scenes of “I’ve been there”

While the scenes of ‘you’ve been there’ oh

Though I try with all my heart

Are like reaching for a shadow

Or a phantom work of art

(I’ve heard tell of times and places

Castles, Ireland so green

Through your kind and smiling faces

I try to glimpse what you’ve seen)

But, my wildest fits of fancy

Or mind-sketches on the air

(Though quite grand) they never can be

Quite the same as being there

I tell you of scenes compelling

You attempt to feel the bliss

But the truth is, just the telling

Is not the same as the kiss

© Janet Martin