Just Because...

 Do you ever wonder what they're thinking when they turn to give you the up-and-down stare?;-))

I don’t like the way your eyes

Travel my body

Ear-marking its flaws

I’d rather you looked me in the eye

And smiled at me

because…

…because you like me and you hope that I will like you too

And because we are human and need lots of grace, oh my,

Because if nothing else, we have that common point of view

Then, just because of it we look each other in the eye

...and smile!

© Janet Martin

A 'Love of God' Poem

The love of God, a still small voice

That can move mountains, oh

It makes the weary heart rejoice

As by His grace we go

The love of God, a Master Peace

It spills from bud to bloom

His whisper bids our worry cease

It fills earth's living-room

The love of God, a faithful Light

In spite of darkest fear

And thus we trust, by faith, not sight

For we know He is near

The love of God, tender and true

Ah, He is in control

...a kind Father, comforter too
He heals the broken soul

The love of God, an awesome gift

To all, not only His

And if we turn our backs on it

How much, how All we miss

© Janet Martin

 2 Corinthians 13:14
May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.

Of Everyday Awe

Sometimes I feel like I live at the kitchen sink, but its all because of scenes like this...

...and they remind me how truly blessed we are!

I love how things oft seen can still steal our breath away

And how life’s common happiness anoints each day we live

And I am ever grateful for the way time can amaze

Us with its ordinariness; the best it has to give

Why do we wish, so foolish-like when life whispers, ‘I’m dull’

Then sudden loss reminds us how full our pockets are

I love it when we whisper to our hearts ‘just be thankful’

Then, though ev’rything seems the same, it is transformed somehow

I love the way the wise men of this world don’t ask for much

But try to make the most of what they have; live-laugh-love-learn

I love the way a common day can slip through our touch

And leave within its wake an ache for its never-return

I love the clock, yet loathe it, young and old beneath its lock

As good and ill are ushered in, in moments softly sealed

Now-here-now-gone it seems to say with ev’ry tick and tock

Where we stay caught between The Seen and The Still Unrevealed

We live most of our lives in what might seem rather mundane

Off to market then home again, a clean-cook treasure-trove

I love how things oft seen that might seem quite common and plain

Can steal our breath and make us feel like kings because of love

© Janet Martin

Summer-Ways

Summer drip-drips and slips into the grip of days gone by

It glides and slides into the wide, wide world of Frozen Past

It gleams; streams with new daydreams through the blue, bottomless sky

It flits in flower-petal bits, a bright-winged color-cast

Summer sweeps, laughs and leaps from deep to deep, hello-farewell

It croons in tunes of willow-swoon and crick-crick-cricket-lay

It blushes, gushes, rushes, hazy hush and daisy dell

Ah, summer tolls in budded bells and rolls through fields of hay

Summer spills, fills and drains the hills of green to brittle bronze

It gallivants and dances like a girl with yellow hair

It wafts, to lofts of yesterday, in soft-spun sun-warm yawns

Ah, summer raves in turquoise waves across fresh graves of Where?!

Summer drones in heat-weary groans hungry for sweater-hours

It dapples lawns with shadow-art and kisses apple-trees

It tickles poplar tresses, trickles down our backs in showers

Then turns each peach-beach-splash-dash-day to summer memories

© Janet Martin

This summer seems busier than some, somehow. 

Sometimes one simply has to stop and bleed some summer-ink into poem before it disappears!

The Path of Circumstance

I stand in the golden halo of a new-born day, 

so glad to know the God that knows 

its every come-what-may

The path of circumstance is unpredictable; its dust

Is full of potholes, hills and dips; no detour large enough

And sometimes things we thought that we could not endure, we must

The hardships of this life, the strife that makes us long for love

The way of days winds through the open countryside and trees

And summer flower-gardens scattered on yon windswept slope

It does not oft prepare us for its vale of agonies

That draws us to our knees and causes us to long for hope

The windows we look through frame the view very close at hand

We cannot see Beyond; the future like an umbral wraith

While we struggle with so much that we do not understand

Here in a land dew-kissed, storm-tossed that makes us long for faith

The path of circumstance is full of unexpected turns

The way of days laid out like steppingstones across time’s sod

The windows we look through frame scenes where the sojourner yearns

For life’s unfailing Confidence; this makes us long for God

© Janet Martin

In the milling crowd I saw him squat beside his little girl, say something to her, then he stood and fixed a syringe to her feeding tube waiting for its sustaining drip-drip to drain into his precious child’s afflicted body.

 I approached him and we chatted a little and he told me of their Valley.

 I asked his name and the names of his family…names I had trouble pronouncing so he smiled and said, ‘call me Job because the English translation of my name is Job’.

I told Job I would pray for him and his family and he thanked me with a calm sincerity that only a true believer can shine, then replied,  'We believe in Jesus. We will be okay!’

What a triumphant proclamation this is for all believers; "We believe in Jesus. We will be okay!”

No matter where life's path may lead 

or what others may say,

if we believe in Jesus 

we will be okay!

Romans 8:31
What then shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us!


Some assurance songs to lift our hearts in praise to He who knows all of our days!