Lonesome-ly Glad

There’s something ‘bout a house at night

Wrapped timber-dark in deeper hue

Of sequin-light and boreal-blue

It makes me feel all lonesome-like

And where the dearest place on earth

Snuggles within night’s mute embrace

A tiny love-tear warms my face

To think upon life’s moil and mirth

And how its little care is borne

On living’s highway; how at night

We crave the humble-sweet delight

Of furniture, love-scarred and worn

And tea-kettle placed o’er a flame

Small hand slipping soft into mine

As Duty eases its design

Letting plush hush employ its claim

And how we crave the lamp-lit room

The chair, the book, the cup of tea

The comfort of you next to me

While overhead unfurls the plume

Of brooding mantle, midnight-mad

Gilded silverly by moonlight

There’s something ‘bout a house at night

That makes me feel lonesome-ly glad

© Janet Martin

Have you felt it while driving home at night and seeing other houses with their lights on...that lonesomely glad feeling?!

Heartlands

Stealthy, across the snow-bound heath the dark is closing in

And silence like a frosted wreath muffles the busy day

Ah, Flight of moments, once again how subtly you wing

The hope of morn to noisy noon to brink of yesterday

As pantomime of suppertime and eventide ignite

A fire on a hearth somewhere in heartlands out of sight

From rush to hush the chanting tick-tock carries our feet

We hurry to the harbor of that dearest place on earth

Of wood and stone, oh darling home; though to labor is sweet

Our heartlands pine for family-time and hours round the hearth

And now the dark mounts aerial steep and draws the shutters tight

The hour is a thing of beauty in deep blue twilight

Time’s journey whirls in sanguine swirls and colors on the air

How easily it seems the dark slips over gold-gray-blue

As easily as youth slips through the gleaming raven hair

To taunt the man of middle-age with silver-stricken hue

The convoys of life’s moments melt on heartlands breath by breath

Riding the darkness closing in across the snowbound heath

© Janet Martin

The kids have no idea how much I love that 'gather-round-the-table-time' as I listen to the tales about their day ...

'Neath the Influence of Ink

No 'private property' signs, no fare. A pen can take you anywhere!

‘Neath the influence of ink

No blockade or broom can bar

Us from that fair and phantom brink

Where our un-penned poems are

Take me to that place, my sweet

Where Time’s field is giddy-green

We will wander in bare feet

Pen away this snow-spell sheen

Lie beneath magnolia-tree

Wade through knee-deep flower-streams

Touch the pen to paper; we

Will dance the doggerel of dreams

Kilimanjaro-height

Noon-hour on Pacific Grove

Mediterranean midnight

Morocco at dawn, my love

Summer-touch on winter-dusk

We can bear the cold, my dear

Fill the quill with moody musk

Vex the senses with a tear

Ne’er will we imprisoned be

As long as our minds can think

Life becometh poetry

‘Neath the influence of ink

© Janet Martin

It Never Grows Old

I was staring through the window, saying to myself as I watch another storm vent itself, ‘This picture is growing old!’ And in the same breath I am spell-bound as a junco battles the gale to land on the snow-drift beneath the feeder…

 No, His wonders never grow old.

It never grows old; His blue-golden-gray

Falling in pictures along living’s way

Author of everything; see how His Hand

Moves through the ages in changeless command

Stunning man’s gaze with the power of His might

Filling our hearts with love-songs of delight

It never grows old; white, scarlet, bronze, slate

Awing spectators of lowly estate

Always spring-green overwhelms white-capped limb

Pictures of wonder and worship in Him

Over and over this canvas of sod

Tugs from its depths darling portraits of God

It never grows old; briefly we embrace

Each vapor vertex of season-spun grace

Ere it slips softly into history’s hold

While a new painting has replaced the old

Drawing our eyes from the crypt of the heart

To nature’s gallery of heaven-art

© Janet Martin

 Look around and praise Him if you are well and fed and clothed enough to enjoy it! What a gift indeed to be ticket-holders to the greatest gallery of all; God’s creation.The past two days were filled with sun-snow SPECTACULARS!

(these are a couple of the 100 or so shots that I've taken in the past few days:)

About Work

 Do you have work? Don't forget to thank God for it every day!

The merchant’s salvation

The sluggard’s dread

But ever the ration

That butters our bread

The wise man's blessing

The dreamer's curse

But ever the jingle

To pleasure the purse

Our waking purpose

Our well-earned rest

Of all that life offers

I say work is the best

Janet:)

Wednesday Poetry Prompt

If you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life.
Marc Anthony

Blue and Brusque

 I'm cooking supper and watching dusk steal ever bluer across the day...gone the glistening sweep of dawn

Brusque breeze intensifies the blue

Begging to brush this day from view

I watch, reluctant to release

This ‘little bit ‘o heaven’ piece

But Time has no regard for hearts

And treats as equal all her parts

She tugs the child from daddy’s knee

And tosses wild and merrily

A mother’s love; hold and let go

Like evening steals across the snow

She reaches with subtle blue kiss

Tucking to naught, this thing that is

A pessimist dies every day

I could not bear to live that way

So I will suffer her romance

Reach for her arms each dawn and dance

Before she winks, coaxing the dusk

To stir its breezes, blue and brusque

© Janet Martin

God's Autograph

I popped through a little hedge and thought I fell into heaven!...

  

...until I came to this;( There won't be No trespassing' signs in Heaven;)

This little lens cannot fully descry

The awesome surfeit of God’s ‘let there be’

His masterpieces filling sod and sky

Amazes our gaze with majesty

We crawl and reach and lean, lie down and laugh

Trying to capture heaven’s autograph

Ah, what is man that God should awe him thus

Again, again He stuns our meager glance

Four seasons worth of wonder drench His brush

No, this is not serendipitous chance

God lets us glimpse the glory of a place

Waiting for all who are saved by His grace

This circle-scope of hello and good-bye

Makes bearable the suffering of sod

As elements of nature testify

In boldest declaration; this is God

We crawl and reach and lean, lie down and laugh

A lens cannot contain God’s autograph

© Janet Martin

…but oh, the bliss of trying to capture fringes of His signature! Is there anything better?! No.

The way these shadows fell across the gully seemed like they wrote, Yours truly, God.

Thus Far

Thus far as moments roll, cajole the sod in season-strain

We sow and tend and reap and rest then do it all again

The pantomime of summertime and autumn-winter-spring

Amalgamates; we contemplate this inhale-exhale Thing

How swift an hour becomes a day; days shape a month, a year

And somewhere not too far away death wields its solemn spear

So we, as moments roll, cajoling sands where seasons spar

Ought to consider now and then, what we have done thus far

From yonder brink, pink turns to gold, then gold to blue or gray

God places in our fumbling hold His gift; another day

But soon it too will don the hue of vapor serenade

A breath-by-breath framed legacy of choices we have made

Ah, we cannot afford to tilt Time’s cup and never taste

This ether draught, so drink it up; one drop we dare not waste

Then stand and stare dispassionate, to midnight’s whimp’ring star

Now is the time to contemplate what we have done thus far

God does not weigh our offerings by what the eye can see

He searches every spirit for love’s best; humility

And rich or poor alike He gives time’s moments to employ

Silver and gold can never buy His hope that brings us joy

Nor can the cash of miser’s stash claim what cannot be bought

We touch a tide we cannot see as action proves our thought

And somewhere One beholds our give and take; Time’s door ajar

Offering grace to human race for what we’ve done thus far

© Janet Martin

I read the words 'thus far' in an article this morning and it jolted a train of thought...