Then, Get on With it...

 Poetics Aside Prompt: Use the last line of yesterday’s poem for the first line of today’s poem.

And then,

Get on with it…

When you have begged forgiveness

…do not return again, again

To grieve those despised failures

Preserving self-pity’s pain

But learn from it and move on

For this, my dear is life

We dance, we slip and stumble

Within its joy and strife

And we would be proud; boastful

Without truth reminding us

That there is none who have not erred

So do not sulk, or pine or fuss

But simply learn its lesson

Ask forgiveness, reflect a bit

But then, my dear, forgive yourself

And just get on with it…

© Janet Martin

So Others May See You

Poetics Aside Prompt: Use the last line of yesterday’s poem for the first line of today’s poem.

Oh God, you give us Life

And for our hatred Love

Into the darkness of our minds

Your Light streams from above

Those without understanding

Scoff at our holy claim

For they have not yet come to know

The Life found through Your name

Oh God, we are not judges

But You alone can see

While man looks on the outward

You behold the heart of me

And I have but one prayer Lord

That I lift up to You

May You behold a heart of love

So others may see You

© Janet Martin

Last night my son and I were having a conversation as he was battling with feelings of being judged unfairly by what another person assumed, and we came to the conclusion that all we can give in return is forgiveness and grace, the thing we hope to receive when we err because without meaning to we all are guilty of assumptions or judgments occasionally. But it is love and only love that we are called to do.

 

Of Verbal Exchanges

 Poetics Aside Prompt: Write a tradeoff poem. Could be an exchange, forfeit, or swap.

We could stand here an hour and bicker

Raising our protest loud

Exchanging brand-new one line insults

That would make the devil proud

We could dredge up past follies and failures

Perhaps even curse a bit

Or we could simply say, I’m sorry

And then ‘get on with it’

© Janet Martin

Incomprehensible Trade-off

Poetics Aside Prompt: Write a tradeoff poem. Could be an exchange, forfeit, or swap.

In place of our guilt- redemption

In place of our longing- hope

In place of our wretched sin-stains

You wash us white as snow

In place of darkness and depression

You fill us with marvelous Light

In place of death and damnation

Oh God, you give us Life

© Janet Martin

 

You Are but He IS...

You are no respecter of persons

In the tropics,

At the Arctic

And all points in-between

You indulge the pauper

The preacher, the child

The writer of songs

Or the queen

How subtly you bleed your presence

Through the laughter of a crowd

And when they’ve gone home

In the silence

You are there

Crooning, ruthless and proud

With never an invitation

And never a stuttered caress

You thrive in the hollow of wanting

You are

Loneliness

There is One who does not leave us hopeless

To grovel in longings despair

He covers the earth with a whisper

And draws us to Him in a prayer

He breathes through the power of darkness

And pierces our grief with His hope

He is the great Father of comfort

When in fear’s dark valley we grope

And He will not leave nor forsake us

Wherever on earth we may trod

He is a faithful companion

He IS God

© Janet Martin  

Stuck

Poetics Aside Prompt: Write a stuck poem. Write about the struggle or the inability to move. Maybe you’re stuck in traffic, in a bad job, or a relationship.

Oh what a vexing dilemma

Stuck madly in the middle of thought

For that wily old Muse

Has relinquished her dues

That long after midnight I sought

But now in the middle of morning

I’m hit with a mystic sort of thud

As from out of nowhere

She spangles the air

While I’m stuck elbow-deep in dish suds

Oh, what a glorious dilemma

Stuck twixt fantasy and mundane

Yet, I should sing the blues

For that wily old Muse

Drives this housewife completely insane

© Janet Martin

Of Echoes and Endings

The boast of the meadowland renders its mirth

Where June’s leaf-song lullaby covers the earth

Red mountain-ash garnet gleams bold on the air

A garnish to limbs; cold and scraggly and bare

The skyline is stripped of its verdant appeal

But keen winds are eager with refurbished zeal

Moaning through the woodland in ghostly lament

Victor of the tatters in autumn’s raiment

Yet still slips its haunting into Time’s great urn

Of triumph and trouble never to return

The echoes of summer and silence compete

Where innocence, progress and Providence meet

 

The belles of first autumn fall prey to the hour

Their beauty lies broken beneath wooded bower

Time; are you tyrant or mercy’s masquerade?

As fortune and folly beneath us are laid

And we, stumbling vessels of longing and lust

Tread on our future of dust unto dust

For we like the leaf, soon will render this clay

And only the soul will escape Time’s decay

But hope clings to Hope, as earth’s somnolent girth

A-waits the redemption of spring’s glad re-birth

And though for a moment the fallow is bleak

We trust in the promises buried beneath

The echo of summer may torment our tears

The dance of an hour soon shapes sudden years

The gasp of the flower falls into the dirt

Destiny consumes both life’s joy and its hurt

The reed, stiff, forlorn, braces for winter’s cold

The heart, tattered, torn must still bear to grow old

While kind wisdom kisses the grief in our sighs

And Beauty bestows her most coveted prize

For Time’s phantom power can never possess

The well-spring of love, hope and happiness

Spring, summer, autumn, winter; glaze the sod

On our waltz to the grave; on our journey to God

© Janet Martin

To my Son/Children...Don't Forget

They say that *‘life is what happens

While we’re busy making other plans’

If that is so, then son, I know
That soon you'll be a man

So before you discover

That you want to fly away

Will you listen for a moment

There are some things I want to say…

Don’t forget to live while you’re dreaming

But dream while you’re living too

Don’t forget to pray because above all others

My son, God loves you

And remember, for every choice we make

There is a consequence

And for every temptation come what may

There is a sure Defense

My dearest son, it’s a big, big world

Yet oh, so very small

Fix your hope above this scope

Of temperamental brawl

And don’t forget when the world is dark

And you feel all alone

I am as close as the front porch light

Or a telephone

And someday when you are so busy

Marveling at time’s swift flight

Don’t forget to call your mother

Even if its just to say 'good-night'
And don't forget, that in her prayers
She always holds you tight

© Janet Martin

Matthew was recalling some times we had when 'he was little'...

and that *quote hit me.