Thursday, January 8, 2015

When Mommies Die...



 

Prayer is a universal hug! Hug Kara and Her family as they do life's hardest Hard!

When mommies die
It rends earth’s sky
With why and hurt
And sorrow’s tear
For oh, we know
No other who
Can take the place
Of mommy-dear

Life’s first love
After God, is she
Who cradles children
In her arms
And there her babies
Oft will flee
To still the tears
Of fear’s alarm

When mommies die
The world cries ‘why?’
Still, our words
Cannot explain
The heart of God
But this we know
His grace is greater
Than our pain

There are no answers
Only this;
That God is good
And He will keep
Close to his heart
With nail-scarred hands
The tally of
Those tears we weep

© Janet Martin


Also thinking of the family in our community(friends of one of my brother's and one of my sister's families) who said good-bye to 'mommy' just before Christmas...



This Thing Suspended in Mid-air...

Click on image to enlarge...



This Thing suspended in mid-air
Like canvas without shape or form
Where we spill our allotted share
Of love and laughter’s sorrow-storm

This thing upon which seasons slip
Yet none can see, in seamless tide
As generation-waves admit
Again, again how quick its ride

…this Thing that none can cup or keep
Or measure, save in days or years
As its rushes from deep to deep
Invisible, yet disappears

This Thing of utter gravity
Granted but once to human-race
Known to our reaching ways as Time
God gives and gives and calls it Grace

© Janet Martin

 Titus 2:11 - For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,

How will we savor His grace today? Mine begins with taking the van to our mechanic.

Wednesday, January 7, 2015

Then After...


Then, after we’ve returned back into our chest again
That which was bared and pummeled and ripped wide with searing pain
And after we relented where we clenched white finger-tipped
The sorrow hinged to sorrow where weakness and honor dripped
After our hearts are nothing but a flesh and blood-veiled sconce
Then, it will carry, not their action but our response 

© Janet Martin

January Poem

Click on images to enlarge..





How raw the edges of your sigh
How blue your roving tune
Where dusk is always standing by
To drink the afternoon

How frigid is your brooding gaze
How feeble is your sun
A labyrinth of silver glaze
Dazzles your tempest, hon

How stormy are your promises
How lonesome is your song
The offspring of your happiness
Ice-cold upon the tongue

How welcoming your blazing hearth
How fine its company
How sanguine your sweet-spiraled mirth
Above a cup of tea

How long and slow the books you bring
How soft and deep the chair
How easy is the beckoning
Of one-more-page affair

How lovely is your stinging name
How pleasant is your poem
For January stokes the flame
That brings our loved ones home

© Janet Martin

There's no place like home on cold winter nights!




Gold Postcards

Click on image to enlarge..



The yard is like a gold postcard
Its edge awash with sash of sky
That holds the fence that holds the tree
Where morning’s cold blue shadows lie

The afternoon will soon attune
Time’s colors to her bowing form
But now, the yard, a gold postcard
Is etched upon dawn’s sweeping storm

How fair is morning’s virgin air
How lovely is this Gift we have
...its dark to light is far, far more
Than breath-ellipses to a grave

…and opportunity is free
Delivered by angel-express
On gold postcards to boulevards
And yards awash with Heaven-ness

© Janet Martin