Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Of Bloom-buttoned Grass





Nothing stays
The clocks betrays
Our silly ways
Of holding on
It strips with ease
The clapping trees
Hiding in seas
Of dusk and dawn

Nothing remains
Though thought unchains
Fragmented strains
Of season-art
Bloom-buttoned grass
Alas, alas,
Beguiles the lass
To trust her heart

Nothing will last
Future and past
Embrace the gasp
Of all we hold
Then, love today
For who can say
Which ‘come-what-may’
Waits to unfold

© Janet Martin

Sunrise




On a rainy morning you are not there
Where I can see your locks of gold
Cascading through the eager air
Into time’s ever-bleeding hold

…and yet, I know you wait beyond
This interlude of come-to-pass
To toss your diamonds on the pond
And tickle shadows from the grass

…and strum the lithesome lily-leaf
Or clothe that far celestial gate  
With coral-periwinkle sheaf
Too ethereal to imitate

The harvest of farewell is long
Desire cannot force away
The echo of a cherished song
Where naught but air holds you at bay

Oft, arm-in-arm we waded through
The noise of rhetoric and rules
 Knee-deep in fields of dream and dew
Where now a sea of sorrow pools

© Janet Martin

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

This Day in June...Canada Mourns







This day sprawling beneath June skies
extends a transient paradise
where we dream dreams with dreamy eyes
and wish our wishes, wanton, wise

This day flows like a river, blue
above earth’s gold-green avenue
where blossoms bloom in sundry hue

This day of hello and goodbye
sprawls languidly beneath June sky
where some will live while others die
but death will come for you and I

This day is like a gift from God
a gem of Time where breezes nod
and skim this place of green-laced sod
where June seems nearly heaven-shod

This day is like a stepping-stone
carved from the grace of God alone
leading from earth to Heaven's throne
God, help us cherish every one

Janet Martin

In our hearts and prayers, we hold them...

This day we mourn with Moncton 

...and Oregon

This song was sung during the memorial service for David Ross

  

For He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust. As for man, his days are like grass; As a flower of the field, so he flourishes. When the wind has passed over it, it is no more, And its place acknowledges it no longer.…Ps. 103:14-16




Of Time and Truth





We learn too much too late; Truth can’t pretend
It stands unaltered in Time’s heaving lake
Immutable, though we bicker and break
The rules only to find out in the end
What our forefathers suffered, just as we
To learn with jaws dropped low and knowledge spent
Because, though headstrong stubbornness was bent
Somehow determined to change history
We cannot change what cannot be annulled
To ignore Truth simply leaves senses dulled

So then, what hope is there of change at all
Or any good to come from the disgrace
Of fumbling, stumbling, stubborn human race?
Are pleasantries a hoax of syllable?
Will the naysayer armed with ‘right’ and ‘wrong’
And foreboding froth spewing from austere lips
Be champion, counting on fingertips
His shallow prize of self-righteous aplomb?
Nay, Truth is not small-talk but mercy’s gift
An anchor in a sea where notions drift

God, rich in love and grace does not digress
Though Time rushes like water over stone
Diluting what our forefathers made known
No hour fazes I AM's holiness
Where puffed up vanity blinds us and greed
Distracts us from The Great Accountant’s charge
Still Truth will guide each humble, bumbling barge
For nothing here can change what love decreed
And though we learn so late what we know, still
The Truth will set us free to do God’s will

© Janet Martin

Heaven and earth will pass away but my words will never pass away. Matt 24:35



Beyond the Star...





Beyond the star dawn draws ajar
A gate in soundless sweep  
From Heaven’s hold a fount of gold
Spills daylight to the deep
A beckoning of reckoning
Stirs in the human breast
Imploring ‘come’, for none can run
From Time’s untiring test

The morn unchains what still remains
Of all that must yet be
From babbling reams the Unknown streams
In coursing mystery
Its cutting rhyme a pantomime
Of future, present, past
Cascading where we turn to stare
At shadows it has cast

This stalwart surge of sunbeam-splurge
Gleaming on polished sky
Soon fades to banks where fallen ranks
Of soldered moments lie
The worship of our chosen love
Will save us or condemn
Beyond the star dawn draws ajar
Time’s gate to ‘try again’

Thought can unveil a dungeon-jail
Where fear’s ruthless parade
Screams satan-lies, drenching our sighs
With rash mistakes we’ve made
But God unveils what never fails
His tender-loving care
Beyond the star He draws ajar
The proof that He is there

© Janet Martin   

Sometimes discouragement weighs hard
and tries to keep us down
but we must run with diligence
to win the victor's crown

...
Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." Matt.28: 19-20