April Quadrille

 PAD Challenge-day 13-For today's prompt, write a forgive poem. 

Green murmur on the meadow...

First timid tufts of flora...

Green murmur on the meadow

 New nest tucked in the brush

And on the verge of birth, a surge

Of calm before the rush

A bud pulsing with promise

A garden, primed with dreams

A zephyr. soft, blue sky aloft

Earth, bursting at its seams

Marmalade-misted morning

Sweet, sun-kissed afternoon

Silhouette-show of dusk’s tableau

‘neath tusk of opaque moon

First timid tufts of flora

Nature’s most modest plumes

Presents its charms to open arms

And eyes, thirsty for blooms

The ground, like Berber carpet

Where tender bare feet dance

Earth’s spartan sweep cannot long keep

Its pristine countenance

April arouses laughter

Wakes joy akin to Heav’n

A robin’s trill, a daffodil

And winter is forgiv’n

© Janet Martin

PAD Challenge day 3-Waiting for spring

PAD Challenge day 3-For today's prompt, write a connection poem.

My daughter sent me this picture of Dear Granddaughter, and three words

Waiting For Spring🌺☔🌞

'Do I have your permission to use it with a poem?' I asked 

to which she replied 'of course'

Ah, just beyond bedraggled fronds of remnant drifts of snow

Beyond the umber overtones before green starts to show

Beyond the gate where we still wait with umbrella in hand

While raindrops waltz from leaden vaults across storm-sobered land

I sense the steady trundle of a sturdy wagon heaped

With a three-season bundle to be sown, tended and reaped

Ah, just beyond the pond still chilled with winter’s aftermath

I hear the dance of bare feet spilled to dusty garden path

And like a teapot tipped to pour sweet sips of mint or chai

I feel the earth, an eager cup lifted to catch the sky

Where just beyond the bondage of what Time alone sets free

I sense an immense barrage of buds turned to melody

Ah, just beyond the wall we cannot scale or clap apart

I sense the love and laughter of a color-happy heart

After winter has gone the way of every winter-old

After earth’s rags of brown and gray are laid with green and gold

After the part after the art that draws ajar spring’s gate

I know once more we will admit that it was worth the wait

© Janet Martin

Ah, just beyond the pond still chilled with winter’s aftermath...

After the part after the art that draws ajar spring’s gate...

March Lion Adios

Jim didn't realize he provided the inspiration for the last line in today's poem

when he told me that he carried out a wee, newborn lamb 

from his truck this morning, as he unloaded sheep

 at a New Jersey meat-processing plant...

'Aw! what happens to a baby lamb in a place like that?!' I asked.

 Jim said the person he met said 'we may be a rough environment 

but we take care of these little guys. 

If we are able, we find the mother and put them in a pen

 until they are taken to a new home!'

March is no lamb today, but rather, a lion!

Let's give him a hearty slap on the rump and send him on his welcome way! 

(after a week where he seemed intent on one last hefty hurrah!)

He has switched today's tune/roar from freezing rain to snow...

The other day there was no denying it; the aftermath of a blizzardy bluster

was still very beautiful...

March Lion rakes the tress of trees. Ah, let him roar

And lunge and claw and fret the firmament that waits to pour

In warmer, gentler breeze o-er violet-dappled hills

Ah, let him rage and growl and sneeze, and waken daffodils

And chimes in lily bells, and climes, blush, gold and green

And perches/porches, where we pause a bit with picnic lunch between

…as nature’s orchestra of bird and brook and bee

And wind wafting through woodlands swathed in mint-frothed filigree

Entertains and delights, as budded bowers brim

As stark silhouettes blur as barren limbs burst into hymn

And 'earth’s fulness thereof' swells with hope’s renewed lays

Where winter is forgotten in worlds besotted with praise

Ah, let him seethe and rage and pelt the windowpane

With frozen tears; ah, let him fiercely shake his mangled mane

And thrash the air with brash retaliation, for

March Lion feels the friendly fervor of spring at his door

Where soon sidewalks will wear new mother’s pushing prams

And verdant meadow fair will host the dash and dance of lambs

© Janet Martin

Ps.24:1

The earth is the LORD'S, and the fulness thereof; 

the world, and they that dwell therein.

Happy Spring Greeting

Happy First Day of Spring!

Gramma finally relented a few days ago

(because we were only a few sleeps away from the date circled on the calendar)

when granddaughter was promised she could finally use 'her favorite teapot')

We garnished our mint-leaf tea with dried marigold and recalled the day we harvested them

while dreaming of delightful garden days to come...

The sun tangles in tresses, still barren, where spring’s debut

Caresses sod and soul with notes of an emerging tune...

The sun tangles in tresses, still barren, where spring’s debut

Caresses sod and soul with notes of an emerging tune

Hope and delight ignite ballads of blossoms coming true

Contentment like a butterfly breaks from winter’s cocoon

And joy peals from a belfry that we sense but cannot see

As Nature keeps God’s promises of what will always be

The breezes tease us with visions of verdant countryside

Hillsides and brook banks beckon us to linger on earth’s loom

To revel in impressions of a trove of gates flung wide

As buds begin to breathe and bulging bulbs burst into bloom

And robins sing a song of spring and Reason dares to dance

As gladness finds fresh anchors in life’s sea of circumstance

The snow recedes like ebbing tides from winter-weary shores

Dawn is an eager child dashing across time’s gleaming sands

Dreams tiptoe, careful not to arouse Old Man Winter's snores

We, well aware of streets soon winnowed by time’s gleaning hands

Grapple once more with tug of wars, beauty and duty spun

On how to make the most of moments melting in the sun

© Janet Martin

For, lo, the winter is past,

The rain is over and gone;

The flowers appear on the earth;

The time of the singing of birds is come,

And the voice of the turtle

Is heard in our land;

The fig tree putteth forth her green figs,

And the vines with the tender grape

Give a good smell

.

Song of Solomon 2:11-13

Where Soon The Barren Tree Will Sing

The idea of this poem started the other day

while soaking up some much-coveted rare sunshine...

Soon, soon the barren tree will burst and be barren no more...

Soon gardens, fantasy-immersed will brim with hymn and chore...

Soon backdrops white, like canvases showcasing stencil-art

Will roll like emerald oceans to where earth and heavens part...

And living rooms will spill to patios and balconies...

As words like ‘b-r-r-r’ and ‘with-wind-chill’ will turn to memories...

Soon finches will wear gold again instead of dull chartreuse...

(It seems for every snow-storm we get this winter

a mild spell follows to keep the drifts from getting too massive,

and constantly teasing us with thoughts of spring)

Soon, soon the barren tree will burst and be barren no more

Soon gardens, fantasy-immersed will brim with hymn and chore

Soon backdrops white, like canvases showcasing stencil-art

Will roll like emerald oceans to where earth and heavens part

And living rooms will spill to patios and balconies

As words like ‘b-r-r-r’ and ‘with-wind-chill’ will turn to memories

Soon finches will wear gold again instead of dull chartreuse

And though we will be older then, we will feel more footloose

After we trade our parkas for the longed-for luxury

Of soaking in the sunshine or in shade beneath a tree

As daffodils with yellow, ruffled frills spilling spring’s mirth

A-dapple hills and dells from legacies held in the earth

Soon indoor tasks will wrangle with flasks welkin, zephyr-kissed

And set at odds the law and order of the to-do list

And winter will slip from its perch with every drip and drop

Where now we slip and slide and lurch and honk and hope we stop

Where now we sip slow cups of java and traverse the world

On parchment schooners, into sagas, page by page unfurled

Soon the gray-drenched duvet that drapes dusk’s dormant countryside

Will flush into a blossom-blushing dew-brushed eventide

And we will pause, perhaps, to marvel at how swift time flies

Through winter, now a sparkle on the landscape of spent sighs

...where hues that brood in wait for spring have rent bud-gates to soar

And stir the barren tree to sing and be barren no more

© Janet Martin

Soon winter will fly away like a blue jay

with beak full of peanut😂

Soon the gray-drenched duvet that drapes dusk’s dormant countryside

Will flush into a blossom-blushing dew-brushed eventide...