Oh Night...

Oh night, you do not shape the silence

Like the quiet of the day

When the harvest is all gathered

And the vesper dies away

But over the mute garden

At twilight, soft you creep

And cover gilded fringes

With your garment dark and deep

 Oh night, sometimes your quiet

Is a comrade, kind and true

But sometimes it is keen and sparks

Raw thoughts of ‘missing you’

And into the still darkness

Our reminiscing bleeds

And only unmarred silences

Its want and wonder heeds

Oh night, you strip away the masks

Of bravery and pride

Beneath the cloak of quietness

We do not need to hide

Or wear for meek appearance

A calm and cool facade

Here in the folds of darkness

It is simply us and God

© Janet Martin

While He is Gone...

A slight variation to the poetics aside prompt 'when he is gone'

While He is gone, beyond our vision

He who put on humble flesh so that He

Would suffer akin, every grief and temptation

That ever afflicted humanity…

While He is gone, where clouds of heaven

Received Him out of our feeble sight

He is preparing a royal wedding

Soon he will come to gather His bride

While he is gone, though generations

Pass, and creation groans in its grief

Yet still he lavishes goodness and mercy

Upon us, in spite of our unbelief

While He is gone, He is not extending

For our torment His patient grace

But while He is gone His love unending

Pleads for the lost beyond His embrace

While He is gone, though the clouds appear listless

And heaven seems distant; though deeply we yearn

What He has said will not be disregarded

In power and glory He will return 

© Janet Martin

When He is Gone...#4

Poetics Aside Prompt; use 'when he is gone' in poem

When he is gone

Do we remember?

And do we pray

For he or (she) as they fight

For our freedom

Every day

When he is gone

Is he (she) a mythical ‘forgotten’

In a world far away?

As they lay their lives on the line

For our freedom

Every day

When he is gone

Do we beseech

To God as we pray

To keep and protect them as they fight

For our freedom

Every day

When he is gone

More than his dearly beloved

Ought to weep and pray

For sons and daughters
And mothers and fathers

Who risk their lives

For our freedom

Every day

© Janet Martin

When Old Man Winter is Gone

Poetics Aside Prompt; Use 'when he is gone' in a poem

When he is gone

The vengeance in the wind will wane

The bully-bluster

Will dissipate

And he will be gentle again

When he is gone

The quiet garden seeded now

With naught but dreams

Will suddenly be full of laughter

Where the frosted furrow gleams

When he is gone

The landscape, mute within his icy grip

Will surge with verdant velocity

As barren limbs burgeon

Beneath thawed finger-tips

When Old Man Winter is gone

We fling the shutters wide

To welcome the out-doors in

But now they are bolted against his pleasure

He tugs at the sky with a grin

© Janet Martin

Due to major posting problems I am no longer posting on their site.

When He is Gone... #2

We cannot tell him then

Those words we ought to speak

Nor shake his hand or hug him

Or kiss his love-lined cheek

The ‘would-have-should-have’ ache

Of thoughts he did not know

Will not be there, if now we take

The time to tell him so

What good are accolades?

Or words, loving and dear

If we wait to express them

When he can no longer hear

Oh, tell him that you love him

Not upon a cold gravestone

But now; for all the words you speak

He cannot hear when he is gone

© Janet Martin

Poetics Aside Prompt: use the words 'When he is gone' somewhere in a poem .

When He is Gone...

Poetics Aside Prompt: use the words when he is gone anywhere in a poem.

When he is gone...

That laughing, little lad

The tree pines for those hours

That once they had

When he is gone

The air is heavy with a pall

Akin to absence of leaf-song

In the latter part of fall

When he is gone

That 'little boy blue'

The tree pines for his return

And perhaps his mother too

Janet~

Passage...

The air does not shudder

And nor does the grass

In spite of the haste

With which you pass

Surely, there ought to be

A kind of farewell

Like a soft melody

Or a tolling bell

But fluid, you slip

Or, do you climb?

An ethereal drip

Of passing Time

You do not wave

Or whisper good-by

But you become yesterday

As you slip to the sky

© Janet Martin

The Lord is our Shepherd

He leadeth our souls; kingdoms rise but to fall

Still the Good Shepherd knows His sheep; hears our call

And we shall not want; sustained by His breath

Beside the still waters; in the valley of death

His rod and staff comfort; in the presence of foes

He prepares a banquet; as love overflows

Surely goodness and mercy will ever prevail

For the Lord is our Shepherd and He will not fail

© Janet Martin

Psalms 23