Friday, April 14, 2017

No Time Like The Present



Pad Challenge Day 14:  For today’s prompt, pick a popular saying and make that the title of your poem; then, write your poem.

Today is Good Friday...the Day we remember Jesus' death on the cross as a once-for-all sacrifice for sin, so that through His gift we may pass into life everlasting from this place of days...


(in memory of one of our fellow-poets who crossed that line this week.
Rest in peace, Andrea Heiburg)

An awe-evoking chill
That line we cannot see
Yet all will cross as heartbeats still
Into eternity

Ah, Death, that sure repose
Hinged to the breath of We
Where time is like a tide that flows
Into eternity

No turning back from Thence
To grasp mortality
After Death’s last deliverance
Into eternity

Time’s Presence verifies
What eyes cannot full-see
A foot-path from earth, seas and skies
Into eternity

Tell me, my dear, hast thou
Prepared for what will be
When we slip from life’s here and now
Into eternity?

An awe-evoking gift
This place where grace is free
Yet ever we approach its shift
Into eternity
 



©Janet Martin

Thursday, April 13, 2017

Sometimes My Heart Is A Squishy Fish



This little heart-melter is the light of our lives:)


Sometimes my heart is a squishy fish
Sometimes a delicate rose
Sometimes it feels like a shield of steel
To ward off enemy blows
Sometimes my heart is a lion, wild
Sometimes a docile dove
But always my heart is a little child
Hungry for a little more love

© Janet Martin

Family-so-Fair

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





It is not always fancy; life's fond family-so-fair
That teaches us to love in ways that no one can prepare
So, ‘Bless this mess of happiness and hurt, oh Lord, we pray
Where we are ever learning something new about love’s way

…how holding on is always the prelude to letting go
As every mom-dad heart is stirred by how fast babies grow
Where there is nothing we can do to slow the hasting years
But treasure what seems common ere its measure disappears

…of laundry-laden lines, of clutter-clatter, hug and scold
Of patience tried and laughter cried while to-do lists spin gold
Of realizing far too late how far too soon we stare
To places empty save for memories that linger there

How fleeting is the heaven of sweet childhood’s innocence
How ever-after ring the echoes of Reminiscence
As, all we learn for certain as we work-play-pray-sleep-plan
Is, family is a blessing we should cherish while we can

© Janet Martin

penned this in snatches between much Thursday to-doing:)


Wednesday, April 12, 2017

Three Sonnets (for yesterday's prompt)

Yesterday was Tuesday, which means  Two-for-Tuesday day.
It's prompts: Write a sonnet or write an anti-form poem
   Due to a busy baby-sitting day I shared these, written a few days ago,
...but being a lover of form and sonnets I would like to try a few new ones today...

(okay...so I got the above paragraph typed before busy, busy day prevailed...but, not without some cutey-pie perks:)
Now it is night...
...let's delight in a sonnet or three, shall we?
There is such tender soul-romance in a sonnet's rhythm and rhyme...

The Shakespearean sonnet has the rhyme scheme ABAB CDCD EFEF GG, forming three quatrains (four lines in a group) and a closing couplet (two rhymed lines). The problem is usually developed in the first three quatrains, each quatrain with a new idea growing out of the previous one.

Dear Lord, the love we have for fellowman
Is more than some grand deed of which we boast
For in the come and go of daily plan
We show, more than we know, who we love most 
 ...and good intent, for all its good intent
Is nothing more than nothing much at all
Until with effort, true and diligent 
We seek to fulfill more than duty's call
 Then, when, if we are asked who we most love
Reply will rely on one simple fact
For the track-record of action will prove
Without a doubt, which laws of love attract
Then we should keep this Evidence in mind
For we love God by how we love mankind


© Janet Martin

 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."
John 13:35



Definition of Italian sonnet. : a sonnet consisting of an octave rhyming abba abba and a sestet rhyming in any of various patterns (as cde cde or cdc dcd) —called also Petrarchan sonnet.




The truth has nothing it must hide, but we
Against our better judgement oft ignore
The Very Thing that Truth is famous for
it does not, cannot change its Verily
And so we hide the truth behind a lie
Hoping that no one notices our guilt
But beneath interrogation we wilt
As conscience-stricken blushes verify
The Very Thing we sought hard to deny
But woe to us with whom we have to do
In spite of uncanny tricks we may try
Words cannot alter that which remains true
It always makes fools of proud you and I
Because truth cannot change its point of view

© Janet Martin

...another English (or Shakespearean) sonnet



The moon hangs like a medal on black silk
...a prize, perhaps for races we have run
or is it the reminder of the ilk
that masters plans that we have but begun
beneath a sun that meters out man's days
where we gaze to and from the place we land
while the orbit of morn to morn soft-splays
a maze that we have yet to understand
for we are of small knowledge under God
and cannot know the thoughts of Providence
as He who instills seed that instills sod
without reminder unfolds evidence
that we are part of a great Master's plan
and all that we can do is all we can

 © Janet Martin

Kettle-bell Guilt

PAD Challenge day 12; write a guilt poem



They stare
And taunt me
Where I sit
The guilt of it
I can’t atone
Until to their will
I commit
Heave-ho,
High-low
Grunt, oh
And groan



© Janet Martin