Of Once-upon-a-Place...

PAD Challenge day 13:For today’s prompt, write a memory poem.

 (This poem will inspire in each reader a purely personal picture:)

Here is a blip of my October-memories

 

There is a phantom place

Where, time and time again

We wander to embrace

A fragmented refrain

For nevermore in full

Can we its tenure touch

As Past’s incessant pull

Peels pictures from our clutch

The best and worst of days

Succumb; becoming naught

But gossamer gold-grays

In the landscape of thought

Where time and time again

We travel, misty-eyed

To what could not remain

Too long on life-song’s tide

The poems Past imparts

Need no interpreter

They rush our heart of hearts

In a bittersweet blur

Of once-upon-a-place

That nevermore will be

Save in thought’s soft embrace

Of this; a memory

© Janet Martin

A Word of Caution

Be careful what you wish for

Be careful what you eat

Be careful what you think

For thought

Transfers to hands and feet

Be careful in the friends you make

They are what you will be

Be careful not to think you are

Above

Be Careful’s plea

© Janet Martin

November's Noon

Gone, the gilded tress

...summer's afterglow

Stark against November-ness

Nature waits for snow

Gone the afternoon

Sailing sylvan seas

Now a low and brooding tune

Strums gray eulogies 

Plucked, each blushing bloom

Drained, each budded stem

November, a cheerless tomb

In death's diadem

 Gone the giddy grin

Of each garden-lass

November pours rain and wind

From a broken glass

November is howling today...

Giddy-up horsey and hurry to town!

...and so he did! (a few hrs. later:)

© Janet Martin

A Somber Soliloquy

When God writes our names

In the Lamb’s Book of Life

He seals our heritage

After mortal strife

Then at the close of

Life’s struggle-and-cope

We will not sorrow

As those without Hope

God keeps His promises

 If we repent

And believe we will receive

Redemption's covenant

...and God is not mocked

His love unrestrained

Will punish all evil

When Hell is unchained

Therefore, fellow-traveler

While grace yet endures

We should make our calling

And election sure

© Janet Martin

After-life

Redemption through His Blood
…For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us; nor was it that He would offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood that is not his own.…Otherwise, He would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now once at the consummation of the ages He has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment, so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him. 

Hebrews 9:26-28

 

I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! 

Its rider was named Death,

Rev.6:8

‘Do you believe in After-life?’

I’ve heard the questioned posed

And much debate ensues about

‘After-these-eyes-are-closed’

Tis foolish to be ignorant

For God has made it clear

That after this life everyone

Before Him will appear

…and it is futile to suggest

There is another way

To the Giver of our Breath

We will return some day

But, Now, Today, grace-gladdened tides

Abound where mercy rolls

And Everlasting Hope abides

The saving of our souls

© Janet Martin