Rain-Rhapsody

It chatters through the eaves-trough

And rushes down the lane

And where the yard was dusty-drab

It spills its splashing strain

It falls in silver anthems

To still the farmer’s sigh

As from dark, tumbled heights it pours

In rivers from the sky

It sings to poets in their den

A sweeping, soulful lay

It rouses in a wee child’s heart

Sweet thoughts they cannot say

And from the polished maple leaf

It’s dazzling diamonds drool

To ponds beneath the dappled sway

In circle-notes they pool

A melody of nature

A poem with no pen

A love-song of benevolence

From Gracious God to men

A fount beyond our reaching

It whispers, soft and low

We are the children of God’s world

And by His grace we go

© Janet Martin

Yesterday, after a sudden thunderstorm passed Victoria sighed and said, 'I wish it was still raining. It made me feel so...' She couldn't find the word to describe what she felt. I asked her, 'Did it make you feel kinda safe and happy to be in the house?' She said it did and I agreed that I have that same 'feeling'. One that's hard to find the right words for. This morning the song and its feeling have returned.

July Sonnets

July; topaz on summer’s diadem

Dazzling creek-banks embellished with wild bloom

A misty, musky, sweet-dusk gilded gem

Co-mingling of both haste and languid plume

The ivy wanders over gate and fence

Enticing us to gardens and sea-shores

A sentimental door of lenience

As dictation of routine softly snores

We linger in cool shadow-haunts and pools

Lulled by the hum of lawn-mowers and such

Like children breaking duty’s rigid rules

We revel now beneath the sultry touch

Of amber noon and amethyst sundown

July; jade jewel on summer’s fair crown

July; strawberry-flavored offering

The burly tones of winter long forgot

As breezes fall beneath the murmuring

Of hazy sighs and hues shimmering, hot

Yet, we embrace the perspiring mid-day

This suffering, not harsh or hard to bear

Our voices drifting, soft and far away

As we fill baskets with ruby-red fare

This is the hour that we hungered for

Of honeybees and strawberry-kissed grins

This is the road that leads to sandy shore

Where the end of our school-year care begins

This is the pinnacle of azure sky

And surging meadowland; this is July

Here summer splurges with sanguine caress

We reach for her; can anyone resist

Her whisper giggling in the poplar-tress

Or crooning in the morning’s purple mist?

Quick raindrops plunk into the silky dust

Where bare-feet dash, seeking timber-lined trail

As we surrender to the wanderlust

Of daisy-field or willow-song regale

Its melody wafting upon the scent

Of fresh-cut grass or clover canticle

The busy noise of our discontent

Relenting to its sweeping spectacle

July; where heat waves ripple placidly

And we, earth’s little people swim its sea

© Janet Martin

We've had a soft start to July, a slow running of hands over wedding plans, a sweet lingering on its shimmering afternoons, and long languid evenings.

Let's Dance

 

All flesh is as the grass

And man is as its flower

We pass this way but once, my love

Let’s fully taste each hour

The bud that spills the rose

Soon renders its romance

My love, the imminence of death

Inspires us to dance

Sweet summer scrawls its sigh

Across the hazy slope

And oh, my love, I sense its haste

Beneath this sun-spun hope

Ah, morning noon and night

How seamlessly you pass

Let’s take this chance to dance, my love

For flesh is as the grass

© Janet Martin

Save the Last Dance For Me

Wishing for Words

Beneath the evening’s summer sky

The mist melts mutely on the dell

Where all the thoughts I cannot tell

Like unhinged flowers fall awry

Life’s imperfection strikes a chord

Somewhere within its ache exhales

As on the air the dusk impales

Itself on thought too keen for word

…and I would spell its vaunt for you

But, oh my love, to bare the whole

Is to unravel heart and soul

And darling, words would never do

Beneath the stars where daydreams sleep

I sample syllables of naught

But none can weave my wistful thought

Drifting into the drowsy deep

© Janet Martin

Sometimes the words that we would say

In hungry silence fall away...J~

Beneath the Willow-tree

  

On evergreen-lined oceans

We wave cheery farewells

Teetering on the tabletop

As Neptune bucks the swells

Aboard a wooden vessel

Young sailors off to sea

Our ship, the picnic table

Beneath the willow-tree

‘Hang on’ we urge the younger

Or with a flying leap

We splash into the garden

Where the water is so deep

For we are champion swimmers

The front yard a vast sea

And we could sail around the world

Beneath the willow-tree

We climb the Alps, the hayloft

Dim and dusty made us sneeze

There, Heidi and her Grandpa lived

They fed us bread and cheese

But we needed to hurry

A war was on, you see

So we scurried back to safety

Beneath the willow-tree

...where the wind tosses its tresses

As seething waters rise

We stagger on the tabletop

And hope we don’t capsize

For the sea is full of monsters

And woe if he or she

Fell to there death in foaming depths

Beneath the willow-tree

So we cling to each other

SOS, we shriek and squeal

Praying for a miracle
We crank a phantom wheel

Then we hear Mother calling

Back to reality

Its chore-time; we drop anchor

Beneath the willow-tree

© Janet  Martin

It didn't look like much...just an old weathered table beneath the willow-tree, but it was a schooner and the tickets were free!

Yesterday was the first day of summer vacation for Victoria and already I've heard the words 'I'm bored'.uh-oh.

Often, in this age of gadgets and screens I find myself thinking,

‘Kids don’t play like they used to’. When we grew up our greatest toy was our imagination. I remember my mother laughing and shaking her head saying ‘what must the neighbors think!’ as we were transformed to whoever we saw in our heads. We didn’t travel much in real life but we all loved to read, these stories fueling our wildest ventures. There was nothing quite as adventurous as ‘playing pretend’…oh, the untold destinations in those words ‘let’s pretend we’re…’and beneath the willow tree the summer fell away as we carried out kitchen chairs if necessary and they became school desks and Big Sister was Teacher and we all were naughty students until she punished us with a sheet of math-facts and suddenly school was over as students stomped off in a huff. We traveled ocean-liners and trains, tamed wild ‘tree-limb horses’, became airplanes...and yes, sometimes we were so bored we thought we were going to die, but then we 'invented' a new game. Boredom's desperation fuels imagination!

Incomprehensible

Thunder and splendor and Majesty reign

Canvas of morning, evening and midnight

Eons of wonder man cannot explain

Born of the Spirit in ‘Let there be Light’

Our knowledge babbles beneath heaven’s sky

Vainly we reach with ineptness of thought

No telescope can begin to descry

The fathoms surrounding earth’s little blue dot

Logic of science must humbly agree

Greater is He that has breathed into space

The glorious grandeur of infinity

Stunning the geniuses of human race

Straining to exceed comprehension’s gasp

Of mysteries unfathomed in depths beyond grasp

Surely the wonder of He who commands

These stars compels us our boasts to resign

For who among us fully understands

Immaculate wisdom or its grand design

We ponder from our footstools of sod

The purposes of I AM’s rendering

Yet we cannot tell the intentions of God

Only that He loves us above anything

And from those vast heavens He speaks and we hear

No one can dissuade the wind and the rain

Or ignore the sun as it gleams in its sphere

From lowered regions of celestial main

We know that we are not in control

But feed on His mercy for body and soul

What is mortal man that ever we dare

To argue with He who holds planets in space?

Or what is a man that God should so care

Sending His Son to save us by His grace?

We bluster and threaten and weep ‘neath His will

But our Living Hope does not waver or wane

New every morning, like dew on the hill

Is Love’s kind compassion we cannot explain

This Builder of universe tenderly pleads

He calls us by name from within and above

We know our wants but He knows our needs

Earnestly He desires our love

Thunder and splendor and Majesty reign

See! the sun rises then it sets again

© Janet Martin

The Way of Things...

We cannot keep the morning

From the afternoon

Nor quell the long blue shadow

Spilling from twilight’s spoon

We cannot pause the moment-rush

The bitter or its sweet

Nor keep the flower’s petal-blush

From falling at our feet

We cannot still the landscape

Charged with our hopes and dreams

Or bind the hour’s billowed cape

Filled with echoed requiems

But we can love, give thanks and pray

And weep if so we must

For soon the flower falls away

As dust returns to dust

We cannot clench the colors

Of seasons as they pass

Nor plot to save the hours

Surging through Time’s wee glass

We drink from founts of mercy

Its offering and then

The flower fades, all but the soul

Returns to dust again

© Janet Martin

Summer Silk

Silky sigh of summer

Slips over our skin

Soft sanguine spiral

Of sun-sparkle grin

Slipping to sonnets

Of silver-spun years,

Soothing our sorrow

With sun-sweetened tears

Surging from spigots

Of gossamer gild

Sunflower echoes

Where summer once spilled

© Janet Martin