Because Not Everything Is As It Seems...

Longing that seems to amplify love’s happiness we lack

May shape the very things we miss some day when looking back

For then, when the big picture has filled in what seems amiss

We won’t remember what it was because of what then is

And all the tender pieces that seem marred at present, then

Might be the very days and years that we would live again

So it behooves us not to look too long behind or hence

But cherish what we hold before it turns to recompense

Darling, love’s pangs that vex woman and man I think must be

A bit of star-dust lodged betwixt hope and reality

© Janet Martin

One More November, Please

PAD Challenge day 30! Oh my, time flies when we're having poem-fun. 

Can't believe another Chapbook challenge is done!

For today’s prompt, take the phrase “One More (blank),” replace the blank with a word or phrase, make the new phrase the title of your poem, and then, write your poem. Possible titles include: “One More Time,” “One More Night,” or “One More Piece of Chocolate.” 

I hope you have one more poem in you.

I told the mom I babysit for the other day that Victoria and I feel November-ripped-off!

So much SNOW!

We always look forward to its bleak landscapes and shades of bronze, browns and smoky blues...

I'll take one more November, if you please???

(this photo was last year)

I’d take another one of you

To drink your ache of bronze and brown

To marvel at your modest gown

Your halo, sullen, smoky blue

I’d take one more; your robe of white

With all its sequins, stars and such

Feels far too cold beneath my touch

It doesn’t fit or feel quite right

I’d take you dressed in dreary gray

Bereft of leaf and field of flow’r

I’d revel in your barren bow’r

I’d dance your dreariness away

I’d paint your picture on my heart

A masterpiece of aftermath

Where autumn’s flame etches each path

In quaint and quiet works of art

I’d take one more November, please

And tell winter to wait its turn

While we trace frost-embellished fern

And dark, stark limbs of leafless trees

© Janet Martin

Autumn-dreamer's Dirge

 Compared to last Monday's mad dash to get the yard, driveway, garage and rain-gutters

 cleared of leaves that fell at inevitable last

 ...this Monday feels like a soft, white sigh...(but oh, what an ocean-surge a sigh can hold:)

Gone, the green-some chatter

Of the leafy tress

Tapestry of tatters, love

Tucked beneath whiteness

Gone the gloomy bearing

Of the tree-line doffed

Naked branches wearing, love's

Whispers white and soft

Gone, dusk’s musky, mellow

Lisping lullaby

Farewell turns to hello, love

Falling from the sky

Gone, the flowered garden

Filled with colors bright

Winter’s wizened Artisan

Chooses white on white

Gone, the yawning pleasure

Of a sun-drenched chair

Vault of ice-white treasure, love

Sparkles everywhere

Gone, the tide of tatters

Strewing yards and streets

Summer’s sigh and chatter, love

Sleeps beneath white sheets

© Janet Martin

Hope Is The Hunger

PAD Chapbook Challenge day 14: write a hunger poem ...

Gratitude Conquers the sin of Complaint!
It does not however fill wholly/holy, the hunger!

Longing, a lion that no one can tame

Who knew a roar could be soundless and still

Ocean-like surges without form or name

Honed by a hunger this world cannot fill

Longing, a hurt only heaven can heal

Tugging where love’s count-your-blessing streams pour

Still, in the middle of wonder we kneel

Crying where craving and need plead and war

Gratitude conquers the sin of complaint

Faith feels a Father’s whisper, ‘peace, be still’

Love is a lifeline where else we would faint

Hope is the hunger that heaven will fill

© Janet Martin

Soulful/Soul Full Surrender

 A local woodland nook....

 ... local lane-ways lined with 'look!'

Soulful surrender, summer’s embers gleam

Painting a picture on purple-ridged ream

Vexing the poet with verses half-mast

Lust for the future from dust of the Past

Frail and flamboyant, fall’s fabric-work vies

For the attention of wonderstruck sighs

Beneath the boughs that birthed buds into bloom

Scatter the tatters from nature’s grand loom

Hush-a-bye hollow of bracken and brook

Here lovers linger in leaf-lavished nook

Sun-startled arbors of scarlet-gold fronds

Rise above rustles of russet and bronze

Wind in the woodland, ah, bittersweet brogue

One day a darling, the next day a rogue

Heaven’s pen dangles from every tree

Teasing the troubadour with what could be

Awe full of autumn and soul full of smile

Dream full of daring to pause for a while

Letting the beauty of seasons applaud

Heart full of hunger and eyes full of God

© Janet Martin