Over Fifty?

http://www.curtoons.com/funny-gag-cartoons/ (cartoon source)

Time is a ruthless painter, so I do declare
I despise my mirror but the mirror doesn’t care
If it’s the truth it’s telling well I’d beg to differ please
Cause I’m still feeling dapper but for creaking in my knees

Some mornings I sprint out of bed just like I used to do
But then a cramp assails me and I holler out for you
and like a weary soldier I limp to the closest chair
You bring an ice-pack for my back; or my derriere

I stopped counting wrinkles when the wrinkles became me
My merry eyes still twinkle, I just wish that they could see
But when I turn the lights out it’s great to be alive
Because when I am sleeping I still feel like twenty-five

Janet

Happy Birthday, Rosemary

The Harvesting of Winter

In the middle of summer’s sweet dog-days
And autumn’s noon of tumbled leaf
Winter falls; and plants the earth
In crops of pure and pristine sheaf

Then every stripped and naked sprig
That shed its robe of evergreen
And every humble, barren twig
Is dressed in winter’s dazzling sheen

The curtailed summer waits beyond
The benediction of a year
And soon the green and leafy frond
In verdant arbors will appear

Blow then, oh harsh and hungry wind
Clothe the earth in white a while
For soon your harvest must begin
It melts away beneath spring’s smile

Janet

Shadows

Tomorrow, today will be history
Its joy and its sorrow
Tugged into the past
God, give us wisdom
To use today well
Soon we will stand in the
Shadow it casts

Janet

Because of love...Observations

There is no drink that dissolves the lump in a throat.

Love suffers long, and is kind. 1 Cor. 13

The right choices are not always comfortable.

Often, they hurt.

But, they are right.

Neither God’s law nor His love is seasonal or optional.

Love bears all things…1 Cor. 13

If we are in love with others we easily love ourselves.

If we are in love with our self, we easily dislike others.

Love is a rose and the thorns.

I would suffer…but only for love.

There is no mile too far for prayer.

Prayer changes things,

but not always obviously or immediately.

Without love, faith and hope are hard.

The outpouring of love cannot remain invisible.

Love…believes all things, hopes all things.

Love never fails. 1 Cor. 13

Because of love, we can make and follow through with the right choices.

'No' the shortest, hardest word in the English vocabulary, to say.

I love you...say it to someone and mean it. It is an instant heart-lift.

J~

Recollections~ (edited re-post)

Later, as I recall this night
Well, very easily I know I might
Forget how the air was sharp with cold
And heavy with hunger for summer's gold
I'll forget the thoughts we longed to re-tell
Where the out-line of two lone shadows fell
Or how the new-moon, frozen in the sky
Was too far away to observe you and I
I might forget how the breezes died
To honor the hour where we cried
But I will never forget the blue of your eye
Or the way your voice broke, when you whispered…
...good-bye

J~

The Hidden Deep

There are hollows vast and deeper
Than the dark of midnight’s sky
There are tears of the heart’s weeping
That no one will see us cry
There is knowledge that is heavier
Than walls of uncut stone
There is more that we will never know
Than ever we have known
There are thoughts that will remain
The words we don’t know how to say
There is a God who knows all things
And He loves us anyway

J~

Cold Snap

The winsome willow of July
Where once I laid upon the grass
And listened to its tendrils sigh
Is naked now with claws of brass
In mellow August breeze it swayed
Her arches warmed with summer glee
And oft it lured me to its shade
To bask within its melody
But now its branches ache and groan
Stripped of the song it once had known

The chatter of the winding creek
Where yesterday our bare feet splashed
Has silenced; laughter waits beneath
Its sleek and polished marble path
The world is petrified and still
Beneath a crystal-coated shroud
And none can argue with the chill
Gripping each breath in frozen cloud
The only marring of the dark
Are footsteps creaking through the park

Where are the charms of pleasure’s sun?
Where is the flow of summer’s breeze?
They wait somewhere with bridled tongue
Biding their time before they tease
The icy candor from the lips
Stone-blue in winter’s frigid mime
And soon they’ll melt the fingertips
Clutching the earth in frozen time
Ah winter too, comes but to pass
Jack Frost embellishes its glass

Janet Martin

We are in a cold snap...but it is not forever.
Soon we will wander once again, those summer trails...

Peace

If all that ever was or is

Resides in His control

There is no need to worry then

But simply to console

My troubled heart with promises

Spoken by He whose pen

Writes messages upon the stars

And on the hearts of men

He paints the whisper of the dawn

In mercy’s perfect art

And in the heavens He has drawn

Our gaze to view His heart

The skies declare His glory bold

Then how much more shall we

Just as He is in days of old

He evermore shall be

If all that is or ever was

Has passed His tender gaze

There is no need to worry then

About life’s tangled maze

As surely as He holds the sun

And moon in his command

He holds the unknown of each one

In love’s most gracious Hand

Janet Martin