Roses at Midnight

How precious were those moments

How dear the common hour

Like buds that gently opened

Into petals of a flower

Love’s laughter was like sunshine

It’s suff’ring like the rain

Its seasons like the rose and thorn

Of life’s pleasure and pain

How hardly we had held them

Before they fell away

Rose petals on a garden

In a world of yesterday

And where there had been laughter

Where rafters rang with cheer

It seemed that ever after

Surely love would wear a tear

The bough of bloom was broken

The loom of gladness rent

Where sorrow was love’s token

Of a lifetime fully spent

But God, so rich in mercy

From petals grace bestows

Stirs from love’s tender mem’ry

The beauty of a rose

From folds of sweetest fragrance

When night is dark and still

The power of mere moments

Performs a miracle

What precious, precious comfort

Fond memories can impart

As roses bloom at midnight

In gardens of the heart

 Janet Martin

Midnight's Rose

There is a bloom that blithely blows

Upon grief’s tomb called Midnight Rose

Dearest by far its fragile form

Beams like a star through sorrow’s storm

It soothes the prick of thorny stem

With ruby-tinted diadem

As echoes from fond days asleep

Return to bloom on midnight’s deep

The air can wear the soul-sweet scent

Where flowered hours came and went

The night is filled with soundless sound

As petals strew Thought’s hallowed ground

Tears cannot wash lost smiles away

Or drown the crown of yesterday

Where oft, softly they reappear

As Midnight Roses draw them near

…and almost we can feel their touch

And presence that we miss so much

Midnight, where rambling roses nod

Cupped in the faithful hand of God

The faithful hand of God, ah this

Is where the crux of comfort IS

With love His compassion bestows

To midnight’s loneliness, a rose

Then pray that nobody forgets

The Bloom that here and now begets

Where, who knows when, its Echo blows

Across the tomb of Midnight’s Rose

© Janet Martin

Simple-Soul Sonata

A glimpse at simple gladness that fill busy everyday with awesome wonder!

How lovely are life’s simple things

Its treasure spills from earthy troves

And grants its wealth to toiling kings

In butterfly and flower groves

How precious are life’s simple gifts

The clink of coin can never buy

The lilt of lark, the dark that shifts

The glory of a sunset sky

How priceless are life’s simple joys

They come in common shape and size

Of laughing, learning girls and boys

Of book-tea-shade-tree paradise

The scent as summer rain splats dust

The love of family and friend

Heart-hearths kindled with hope and trust

As fond farewells and hellos blend

A window warmed with flower-jars

An hour here or there, care free

To stroll a knoll of wild-bloom stars

Or loll beneath noon’s blue-sky sea

A poem penned by ink or spree

Of humble tumble-weed, a fence-

line fit for finest royalty

Festooned in nature's innocence

  

How fully fair life’s simple Best

A puddle full of golden sun

And for the one who knows God, rest

And heaven when this life is done

© Janet Martin

 The LORD is good to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works.

Psalm 145:9

My Prayer-book

My prayer book is the Bible, oh,

A rose, or wind-tossed trees

My prayer book is the trial’s blow

Sent to bend stubborn knees

My prayer book is a daughter, far
away or at my side
A son grown taller than his father
Rife with dreamer's pride

My prayer book is my mother, ah
For oft her head was bowed
As she surrendered to the law
Of what God's love allowed

My prayer book is the Vast Unknown

It teaches me to trust

While laughter, longing, grin and groan

Tunes its Cardinal Must

My prayer book is a baby-child

Innocence watching me

My prayer book is ‘maybes’ run wild

That thwart what I can see

My prayer book is the love I hold

The love I wish I had

The love that jars me with its gold

And weights me with its lead

My prayer book is the dark of night

Silence can wail with fear

My prayer book is the Morning Light

Kind proof that God is near

My prayer book is soft, whisper-bound
A Tome of death and birth
While thought turns pages without sound
God moves heaven and earth

© Janet Martin

May This Day...

May this day be like a highway

Leading to the sick and poor

Rather than a feckless my-way

Filled with lust for more and more

May this day be like a garden

Where we tend the tender root

Before harvest proves the hidden

Bent with visage of full fruit

May this day be like a chapel

Wall of wind and roof of sky

May we be a humble people

Singing songs to God on high

May this day be like a window

Facing north, south, east and west

Framing, in the wake of it, oh

By the grace of God, our best

May this day be like a front line

Where we war for Heaven’s gain

Knowing, though sight veils sweet Zion

Our fight is not in vain

May this day be like an altar

Where we burn idols of stone

As we make the heart a Psalter

Of worship to God alone

© Janet Martin