Role-Call (before the Roll Call!)

Waiting for Victoria's bus...

Wake up, wake up, the cup that tips and spills time’s quintessence

Pours morning’s glory-tide across the yard, brook, field and fence

It rushes through the downtown square and skims the heaving sea

A holy invitation from heaven to you and me

To break the bread of life where joy and strife their portions mete

To give the whole of heart and soul to every crumb we eat

To return to the Giver with our simple say-and-do

A hearty, humble labor that manifests love’s “thank-you”

© Janet Martin

 Bye-bye, Victoria!

 Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might;

Eccles.9:10

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.

Col.3:23-24 

Up And At 'Em... Giddyup

 Above lines from the poem Reveille by A.E. Housman

Once in a while I come across a poem that makes me utterly swoon...

This is such a poem!

I can't believe how often the morning-poem I sip with my coffee ties in with present-life! 

Matt started trade-school this week. One of the guys he car-pools with lives on a dairy-farm and he told me this guy chores before they leave at 7:00 a.m. Another of his class-mates works at our neighbor's dairy farm and yesterday he worked an 8 hour day/night at the farm after his school day...

I love a 'lad' who jumps up, not afraid of hard work! 

The last verse of the above poem, words to live by for all of us!

These fields don't look like this because someone stayed in bed...

 “A little sleep, a little slumber,
            A little folding of the hands to rest,”

      Then your poverty will come as a robber
            And your want like an armed man.

Prov.24:33-34

I've kiddingly said more than once sometimes it feels
like the hardest part of my day is going from horizontal to vertical...
as soon as I'm up you couldn't pay me to go back to bed, 

but WOW! while still snuggled there it feels SO good😴

Up and at ‘em, touch them toes down

Pry the lid from life at large

In the belly burns a fire

In the fingertips a forge

Look, oh lyricist of laugh-lines

Time enough is hasting by

Where the orb of early morning

Drinks the darkness from the sky

…where the pink ink of permission

Spills a Holy Signature

From the Author of creation

To the hero and the cur

Sack soon siphoned of its music

Bag of borrowed bric-a-brac

Saddles both beggar and chooser

On time’s one-way no back-track

Days are not a dime a dozen

Time is not a fortune free

Mornings are a gift from heaven

Offered without guarantee

Listen, can you hear the crashes

Where Time’s surf rolls gray-gold-blue

'ere this turf of dust and ashes

Soon collects its ordained due

© Janet Martin

A Simple Thank-you for Simple This...(and a prayer request)

 Thinking of my brother Dave today(see below) as I survey a mountain of 'mundaneness'
I can lift the laundry up to the clothesline without second thought or pain!

Thank God for the plainness of common mundaneness

The beauty of duty that puts us to work

It saves us from sorrow of trouble we borrow

When idle mind dawdle where demon-lords lurk

Thank God for the wealth of good health, strength and hunger

Driving us to toil with more purposed pursuit

Wild wolf at the door, love, moves us ‘cross the floor of

Plain planting and pruning before gripping fruit

Pity the lazy, lackadaisical dreamer

Weighed with wanton taunt and fat-cat attitude

Thank God for life’s labor and toil’s simple saber

It keens with kind favor, humble gratitude

Thank God for the glamor of swinging a hammer
And pray for those who dearly wish that they could
Thank God for the plainness of common mundaneness
And never forget... it is good, it is good

© Janet Martin

Please continue to pray for my brother Dave and Karen's encouragement. 

(click link for previous update posts)

Dave still has very limited use of his arms and shoulders and is then, unable to work...a true trial! 

They really appreciate continued prayer!

Thank God For Work...Happy Labour Day

 Though to-do lists this time of year can seem over-whelming,

 Thank God for work!

Everything tastes better after a good day's work...whether food or sleep!

Thank God for work to fill with worth

The hand; pray, idleness we shun

Lest lack of cause for pure applause

Robs us of joy for jobs well done

Thank God for chores where Want implores

The idle mind and hand to lust

Look; what began as Curse to man

Works for our good…tilling of dust

For nothing breeds unholy deeds

Like hands set idle in the lap

So love, if you have work to do

Pause for a bit and clap and clap

Thank God for toil and labor’s spoil

Trust Him for strength to see us through

The commonness and loveliness

Of having lots of work to do

© Janet Martin