The Waiting-Tree

 They stand tall, dressed in their stark-naked best

Cloth of mist wafts, a silk scarf soft-kissed

And twisted through arms cradling empty nest

Where sky-tears glimmer, gray on out-stretched wrists  

Like longing, they wait; what choice do they have?

Strength of subjection is quietly brave

Futile the tantrum and wasted the tear

Hushed, they garnish the thin edge of the year

There is no fast-forward-rewind on Time’s wheel

Who is so great it can its law appeal?

The tree’s full glory is stripped like a reed

Nature, subject to what God has decreed

…and so they stand tall in their stark-naked best

Waiting for fall to become winter-dressed

There is a startling, sweet simplicity

In the humble subjection of the waiting-tree

© Janet Martin

Of Picture-laden Streams...

Sometimes I think I’d like to save the thought of you where blue and gold

Drip heedlessly twixt me and you on our way to growing old

But thought has a mind of its own refusing oft, to quite adhere

To commands whispered where the tone of moments croon and commandeer

These moments fill the gap that grows where that last yesterday we spent

Is covered ‘neath a hundred snows or more and it seems time is bent

On kissing, pressing other places, faces where once you and I

Were not so old and full of moments poured from pitchers in the sky

Sometimes, in the sudden quiet aftermath of push and shove

I remember; you and I slip from resolve’s cold, olden glove

Long enough to keep the picture that would fade away, I fear

While I saved it where new moments press and push and pioneer

We, for a lifetime of moments cannot relive even one

Seasons have a way reaching over all we’ve said and done

And the rush of tides beneath us keeps us on our toes, it seems

Where thought flounders in the free-fall of new picture-laden streams

© Janet Martin

gotta go. time to tidy today's 'picture-streams';-)

As We Go...

It's not so much the type of trouble

That vexes our treks of sod

But our short-sighted approval

And the lack of trusting God

Peace that passes understanding

Is not for the faint of heart

But for those solely depending

On He who its peace imparts

We would all be better for it

Save ourselves a heap of woe

If our own pride we would forfeit

Fully trusting as we go

Janet~

Of Care and Courage

Care runs ready fingers over laugh-lines of youth

It weighs the spirit with want, need and truth

Life has no easy-street without any trouble

Lest ever we think it; pop goes its bubble

Its care, in spite of our ‘rather-would-not’

Trains us to labor with what we’ve got

We cannot order or arrange morrow’s air

Nor tug the veil from its stalemate of care

Our utter hope, when it’s all said and done

Is not how we cope but Who we lean upon

All we can do with our share of care’s test

Is ask God for courage then trust Him for the rest

© Janet Martin

...To Come Home to

When night curls close to every window

Filling the firmament with deep-deepest blue

When it washes over daylight, a sea, quiet

I’m glad I have you to come home to

The dark ink of twilight writes ‘good-night’ on pages

We scribbled with delight and defeat

Its waves lap soft through tree-lines and soul-spaces

Jarring reality, bittersweet

Thought turns to simple and profound desire

Utterly glad for the blessing of you

Who needs more than a humble home-fire

And the touch of loved ones to come home to?

© Janet Martin

Last evening suddenly something came up and I needed to go out for a while. On returning home as I saw a family member through the window my heart lurched with gladness for someone to come home to, and sadness for those alone with nowhere to call home...

December...again

The bud that broke and thrilled the limb

That spilled in floral diadem

Has wept its petals to the breeze

And long forgotten centuries

The marsh that throbbed with giddy trill

Of spring-peepers, is stiff and still

The garden, once a paradise

Of bloom; a tomb of tattered sighs

How swift spring-summer-autumn drift

To epitaphs scrawled on a gift

Of moment-gold we cannot hold

For Time is insistent and bold

…and strips the bud that broke and thrilled

The limb where spring and summer spilled

To winds of phantom, freight-like train

That brings December once again

It rumbles from wide open skies

And showers silver sparkle-sighs

To eventide once dull and brown

December is November’s crown

© Janet Martin

I was inspired by the scraggly limbs outside the window...gone the sleepy, leafy sigh of summer-autumn lullaby

 December's crown is a little brown right now...but we're not complaining. November was much whiter than we needed it to be;-)