Of Gates and God

The sun climbs high into the sky

The Unknown does not offer

A greater glimpse to he who trusts

Than to the brazen scoffer

Our fingers rest upon a staff

All we can do is follow

And trust the One who forms and fills

The Unknown's hidden hollow

© Janet Martin

This morning I had a sensation of lifting a latch to open a gate

I cannot predict the twists and turns of life that lie in wait

But all I know is He who goes before me knows the way

I bow my head and beg for trust before I touch this day.

Summer Vesper

 The sunset was, u-u-u-m-m...grand. Actually, there are no words for what the sunset was...

The shadow climbs the gilded gate

Beneath dusk’s grand pavilion

Until blue depths obliterate

Its silhouette horizon

Against the quiet aftermath

Of mid-day’s bustling duty

The Painter of life’s little path

Unfurls night’s somber beauty

And now the sweet familiar dons

A strange and mystic splendor

The moonlight pools on silver lawns

In midnight’s mellow candor

The charcoal hush dims gold and red

Brushing garden and meadow

As all the world is tucked to bed

Beneath night’s velvet shadow

The lithesome step of eager child

Dashes through dream-land pasture

The brook that threads the begging wild

Murmurs in muted laughter

The tangled tress of raven limb

Strums softly with silk fingers

The air is drenched with midnight’s hymn

Where hope and heartache lingers

© Janet Martin

Sweet Summer

Sweet summer sweeps in green-leaf leaps

And gold exhilaration

From mystery to history

And quiet contemplation

Sweet summer swirls, where time unfurls

A swift and subtle stealing

Of sun-flow’r splash and flip-flop flash

Beneath cerulean ceiling

Sweet summer sways in heat-wave haze

And weeping willow-tresses

A serenade of dappled shade

Of iced tea and sun-dresses

Sweet summer sings in offerings

Of petal-perfumed pleasure

In honey-bees and bonny breeze

And muted moment-measure

Sweet summer sighs in veiled good-byes

Where aspen silver shimmers

Against the blue-sky avenue

And in the tear that glimmers

Sweet summer sinks beneath the pinks

Of rhododendron and roses

We touch and taste its gifted haste

Before its shutter closes

© Janet Martin

This summer is sweeping along far too quickly.

Of Kind Places...

The laughter of the summer-sky

The beauty of the morning

The lily and the butterfly

In nature’s fair adorning,

The sweep of seasons as they flow

Would grieve without atoning

If we did not have, here below

Love’s kind place of belonging

Where is your sweet home of the heart?

What soothes your silent longing?

For we all need love’s dearest part

That kind place of belonging

And then, though life may treat us wrong

In conquest raw, demanding

What joy to haste where we belong

To quiet understanding

We ought not squander energy

On things cold, hard and graven

Where greed and gain, love’s enemy

Destroys its tender haven

But as we struggle on life’s road

Of loneliness and longing

I pray we each find here below

Love’s kind place of belonging

© Janet Martin

My brother Dave is not a man of man wasted words, but I find what he does say is worth a listen, and today, a sharing....

 "A home is not a house and things we own  -  but a sense of being where we belong  -  a place of safety , security , comfort , LOVE , -    and everyone wants to belong - desires to belong  - and needs to belong." 

Thank-you Dave, for this morning's inspiration.

I'm reading the 4th book in The Walk Series by Richard Paul Evans. It is a story about a man whose loses his wife, home and belongings so he begins walking and a journey to discovery...a great read!

Summer Sonnet

Why do you haste with step so lithe and fleet?

Who must you visit and why do you rush?

The essence of your lilt is bittersweet

For as you spill in coral, floral blush

Where golden rod and milkweed plume compete

We feel you slipping through the underbrush

And while our arms are laden with your mirth

Or else while we run fingers fondly where

Soft spring had stirred the atrium of earth

We sense a winnowing upon the air

Within the sweep of harvest-heavy girth

Within the answer to a farmer’s prayer

And as we linger in your citadel

You softly draw us nearer to farewell

Place your distraction kindly at my door

For I am eager to be entertained

With sunny days or raindrops as they pour

From lintels high above, free, unrestrained

Yet, even then I cannot quite ignore

The imminence of something yet contained

Within the hours as they gently reach

To fill our baskets with glad garden-grace

Or in the waves that roll across the beach

Or in the canopy of walnut-lace

I taste it in the sweet smile of a peach

And I have lived enough to keenly feel

Your precious moments dripping from Time’s reel

The splendor of your tender eventide

Cannot persuade me to mourn or to dance

I am enamored but you do not hide

Time’s truth within your rose-petal romance

How swift it seems the night and day divide

Your portion; the vine covers the fence

And Queen Ann’s lace gilds every meadow-lane

I am not sad and yet my gladness aches

For in the rippling grass and golden grain

The Hand that gives is the same Hand that takes

And I can never perfectly explain

The beauty of this pain that gently breaks

Surging within, in humble, soulful praise

For the sweet rendering of summer days

© Janet Martin

Those Choices We Make

For those choices we make

That are lonely and hard

And often misunderstood

What comfort to know

God knows and cares

If we choose those things we should

When we stand before Him

On that Great Day

Where nothing is concealed

It is good to remember

In the choices we make

The truth will be revealed

© Janet Martin

To choose to do right can be a lonely thing…but God sees! My girls and I were chatting about this and I told them what once my dad told me; "Remember, when we stand before God it will be ourselves and Him, nobody else; (no one to point to and say, but they did it) and He will know every single time we said ‘no or yes’ to honor Him. It is not easy but it will be worth it all!" 

 Fear them not therefore: for there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known. What I tell you in darkness, that speak you in light: and what you hear in the ear, that preach you on the housetops. And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Matthew 10:26-28

Recompense

The highs and lows of joys and woes

Are living’s dispensation

They try and test our boasted best

With tears and consolation

But, in the end its complex blend

Renders a certain recompense

For good and bad, happy and sad

All adds up to experience

...and wisdom's gold does not unfold

 If we shrink from its reaching

As life employs its grief and joys

And we learn from its teaching

© Janet Martin

But, Of Course

 

‘But of course’ you whisper and sweeten my sigh

I don’t like the spaces after good-bye

When the warmth of your kiss has grown cool on my lips

And I touch you, but only with thought’s fingertips

‘But of course’, you murmur and do not pull away

Though you are sequestered to yesterday

Where laughter and lingering and letting go

Swirl, twirl in a vortex of love’s high and low

‘But of course’ you repeat as you slip from my reach

For Time does not sympathize, though I beseech

It lends its bestowal, then, in spite of my pleas

It gathers its granting to sweet memories

© Janet Martin

Shall we dance? I ask of this day and it replies, 'but, of course'.