A Pre-Christmas Prayer...The Reason

Wend the wonder of this season

Through the rush of to-do list

Impress through our haste The Reason

Lest the heart of it be missed

Over living’s daily scurry

Precious Jesus, stir within

Deeper meaning to our hurry

Lest we bypass Bethlehem

In the presents and the glitter

Keep The Reason ever-near

Let Hope’s tender-sweetest whisper

Be our blessed Christmas cheer

Thread our thought with true thanksgiving

Draw us to the manger-bed

Calm our mind with Heaven's offering

Lest The Reason we forget

Wrap Your beauty through each duty

Fill our hearts with gratitude

Jesus, give us hearts like Mary

As Love’s Reason is renewed

© Janet Martin

My heart started to race this morning…to-do lists appear no matter how much we vow to simplify; there are expectations, right? And we love to do them but oh, Jesus, keep large within us The Reason for each gift and celebration and may we never simply purchase to adhere to expectation!

Dawn Devotional

Once more the circle of the sky

Above the plot that we call home

Has brushed its darkness back to light

In whispers wafting earthward; ‘come’

And where the cover of the night

In blankets blue with snowflake swirls

Tucked yesterday’s today from sight

Another day of grace unfurls

Ah, Father of celestial slope

Gather like darkness our despair

Ignite the candle of our hope

And rest Your hand beneath our care

© Janet Martin

Tender Splendor of December

So, I arrange you quietly

And put you where you ought to be

But you are never far from me

Oh, splendor of a memory

The quietude of eventide

The flickering of firelight

Invites your shadow back to life

To vex me tender at my side

Ephemeral eternity

In turquoise echoes of the sea

Another season slips from me

To render tender memory

December binds the buoyant year

To drift where all days disappear

Hush, hush, contender of my tear

And potter of thought's silent sphere

For, though I put you out of sight

Somehow, the solitude of white

And flickering of firelight

Invites you here to dance tonight…

© Janet~

Of Flowers and Futility

We cannot quench the tide that steals the hour

Or press back into bud unfolded bloom

Miniscule moment; mute and mammoth pow’r

Of jubilee and weeping by the tomb

As on this surging once-upon-a-time

We live love’s poetry of now-to-then

In sonnet, free verse, stilted lilt and rhyme

Of flowers thrilling, spilling to the glen

Darling, how futile is the yearning tear

Can anyone afford to stand and stare?

While moments pour into the atmosphere

And none of us can go from here to there

There are no compromises with a clock

Let’s brave the craving wave of tick and tock

The flower of the field must fall away

And we are like the little flowers too

Youth surely is the smiling month of May

Of greenest greens and laughter’s bluest blue

The essence of a moment stuns our grasp

Its staccato a chant of year on year

As autumn’s presence severs soft, we clasp

The echo of those dances we hold dear

Darling, the gossamer of gold and gray

Entwines its tendrils round about the heart

And even as the petals fall away

We recognize the hope its seeds impart

Turning our faces to Time’s gale we brave

Its treasure-trove travail toward the grave

How futile then to weep for what is not

Or urge into fruition yesterday

The hunger of an ever-pining thought

Is but to purge the passion of today

Darling, the door to yesterday is barred

Its farewell borne on midnight’s begging breeze

Relinquishing fragmented memories

Like leaves that scuttle over winter’s yard

Frolic of freedom spirals to the sky

Love’s monumental Rembrandts sealed in thought

Of babies in our arms before the cry

Of something stronger drew them from their cot

We wave from windows as our whispers burn

Kissing the air with prayer for their return

© Janet Martin

I sort of 'puttered' at this poem throughout the day ...at the end the last stanza I wrote became the first stanza and vice-versa

That Testing Word

  

 The above poem is thought to be written by Edgar A. Guest but there is some debate on the author of this poem...

When I don’t want to

When I’m feeling low

Weighed with a presence of

Worry and woe

When I weakly ponder

That testing word, ‘quit’

And my weary being

Hungers for it

...Then I think of Jonah

In that fish until

He was prepared

To obey God’s will

So I re-endeavor

Simply to try,

For God is Giver

By His grace go I

© Janet~

We Wake to Winter...

We wake to winter warmth

The emptiness of dusk

Is wrapped within a mantle where

The wind roved wild and brusque

Then, while we were asleep

Heaven softly unfurled

A merry, mercy-melody

Upon a weary world

We wake to winter-white

Gone, earth’s grim, sullen stance

A filament of child-delight

Renders post-card romance

And where bloom-shimmering

Decked summer’s smiling girth

Ten-thousand-thousand kisses wing

Their way from God to earth

We wake to wonderlands

An argent aftermath

Of angel-throng and silver-song

Falling from heaven’s path

Sleep well, oh, slumb’ring seed

Beneath your quilt of snow

For soon you’ll hear your mother say

Wake up, it’s time to grow

© Janet Martin

Victoria woke with a big smile; sometime in the night the snow returned!

Immaculate Invitation

Oh hush, the imminence of something trembles on the air

Of mystery and mercy winnowing the keeling deep

And I am drawn against my will from midnight’s gentle sleep

Toward its brink; and yet I do not know what tarries there

Arise; we must be going for The Hour is at hand

And like the bride preparing to meet her beloved groom

We go; the proof of Something sweeps earth’s yawning living-room

Stirring in dusty street, hillock, sea-song and sky and sand

Can we afford to slumber while This Awesome Thing is laid

Before our wondering gaze? It spills from hope’s immortal spring

Into our care, it fills the air with Passion’s offering

Beneath our feet; an affidavit holy, heaven-made

…and Darkness has no power where this lovely Thing is born

The past is but its shadow and the morrow fantasy

But see, upon the lea Today and what is yet to be

Beckons to all, oh come, behold the glory of the Morn

© Janet Martin

As long as earth endures…day and night will never cease. Gen. 8:22

Of Dark and Light; of Death and Life

The hollow of this night is dark and deep; the crescent moon

Obliterated by the blacker black of heavy cloud

Ah Death, oh Death how morbid would be thy eternal swoon

And darker far than this dark night of midnight’s moonless shroud

If not for Pardon’s promises sealed by Love’s dying breath

As He cried ‘it is finished’ conquering the curse of death

Foolish infatuation cannot save us from The Truth

How swift our little leap is summoned; dust returns to dust

Life has no guarantee; old, infant, middle-aged or youth

Are not assured of one more day; we place our earnest trust

In He who holds us tenderly and tolls the Evening Bell

Who will be next to answer it, our God alone can tell

Surely Goodness and Mercy longs to save us from Death’s fate

Love paid the Way from life to Life; His grace a boundless Room

We must make our election sure before it is too late

Salvation is The Gift and its rejection is our doom

Eternity is long and we are all one breath away

From that sure, solemn summons of that final Judgment Day

The hollow of this night is dark and deep; but soon the dawn

Will murmur in the foothills softening night’s heavy veil

And then another day of grace softly descends upon

The human race of dust to dust; compassion fills His grail

As He extends this span of Time for He beholds the cost

His will is that not one of us should perish and be lost

Janet~

The sky is a mass of black clouds tonight.  In darkness our eyes search for Light, and Light instantly pierces Darkness.