Saturday, August 29, 2020

Some Say It Is A Mystery...



Who tunes the tug that wakens want
and charges hope with dreams
Who vexes awe with wishful taunt,
both bursting at its seams
Who makes us feel like family,
yet also strangers too
Or helps us brave Uncertainty
where all of life runs through
Who tries the joys of living
with desire’s discontent
Who tames mournful misgiving
where all that we have is lent
Who splits the silence with its thunder,
yet without a sound
Who wakens speechless wonder
where nothing new can be found
Who grants the courage to proceed
toward Yet, undefined
Who plants the seed that uproots greed
and helps us to be kind
Who wounds our soul-full stature
by our human nature, pride
Who runs our murmurs through
with million mercies un-denied
Who sends a shiver through our forms
twixt past and future caught
Who rends the rock with rivers; storms
the halls of idle thought
Who steals our breath with butterflies
And meadows, flower-strewed
Who fills the fathoms of our sighs
With dumbstruck gratitude
Who authors opportunity
or thirst that drives us mad
With countless possibility
in spite of loss we had
Who riles the poet with a pull
of tides, intangible
Who quickens the Invisible
with Inevitable
Who holds the key that helps us see
more than sky, sea and sod
Some say it is a mystery
But I say it is God


© Janet Martin

Job 38:1-4

Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said:
2“Who is this who obscures My counsel
by words without knowledge?a
3Now brace yourselfb like a man;
I will question you, and you shall inform Me.c
4Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? 
Tell Me, if you have understanding. 



How Sacred Is The Place...

Sitting At The Feet Of Jesus

How sacred is the place
Where earth and heaven meld
Where in the Saviour’s kind embrace
Hope’s heart and mind are held

How comforting to flee
To I AM’s mercy-seat
And overcome the enemy
While kneeling at His feet

How gentle is His Voice
How patient is his ear
Even in sorrow we rejoice
To know that He is near

How righteous is His law
His judgments true and just
How sweet is worship’s humble awe
How secure is our trust

How faithful is His Word
Through faith alone revealed
Where in communion with the Lord
Hope’s heart and mind are healed

How sacred is the place
Where earth and Heaven meet
As we, because of Mercy's grace
Can fall down at His feet

To shield us from torment
As Satan's legions flee
Where He who is omnipotent
Sets us upon His knee
 
 © Janet Martin
 
2 Thess.2:16-17
 Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God our Father, 
who by grace has loved us and given us eternal comfort and good hope,
encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good word and deed.




Friday, August 28, 2020

Not Gone Too Soon...(a letting-go-of-August medley)

 


 
A hint of blush begins to push
Through limelight plumes and sedum bush
Bloom’s hearty grip begins to slip
And yield to nature’s leadership
Where morning pours quadrillion stars
To dazzle heatwave-weathered bars
Where crickets never sleep but keep
A constant rhythm of cheep-cheep-cheep
Where orchards bend with dividend
Where minnow-tickled shallows wend
Where gardens brim with harvest hymn
And humbled thankful hearts join in
With flat tone of cicada’s drone
And raucous crow and blue heron
Where peach-juice drips from chins and lips
And sweetens tender farewell-trips
With sighs that find in ties that bind
The present to paths, echo-lined
The common ground where sight and sound
Is eternally summer-bound
In spite of hints in amber tints
And early, rebel russet glints
Among the sheen of laughing green
Ruled, like we, by a Hand unseen
Nay, kindly held while moments meld
Into a Song of Season Felled
*While cellars fill as seed-pods spill
The perfect timing of God’s will

© Janet Martin


*While hazy noon like cello-tune
Serenades Something/Summer gone too soon
Was originally the last two lines but something didn’t feel ‘right’
So I let it simmer a bit as I began the day’s duties rife with seasonal delights
And suddenly I knew what was missing…my summer-heart's surrender to God’s perfect timing!




Thursday, August 27, 2020

Compositions...(from many a common afternoon)

above photo credit Emily Curry; used with permission from tot's mom

below photo credit;  Victoria Martin




 

The passage to the past is strewn

With many a common afternoon

The melodies that echoes play

Composed on bars of day-to-day

As seasons spill the ilk of hymns

Where beauty with the broken brims

As hurt and hope of high and low

Composes from wonder and woe

The words that learn to be more kind

Where awe and angst are intertwined

Composing haunting harmonies

Like rain that falls through August trees

Where leaves like large, lush platters splay

But cannot hold the silver lay

That drips and slips into the earth

The tomb of death, the womb of birth

While we stand on its teeming sod

And contemplate the ways of God

That none can thwart or circumvent

As we escort with wild lament

The mercy that flows faithfully

To the plain likes of you and me

Where opening to curtain close

Can’t help but tenderly compose

A humble hymn of gratitude

For many an afternoon, soft-strewed

As moments so casually cast

Compose the passage to the past

Where none can hold for long the part

That writes the song that tunes the heart

That pray, before its anthems fade

We heard the music as it played


© Janet Martin


So disappointed this pic blurred.
I handed Jim the camera while I was doing dishes after Melissa's birthday supper on Saturday
before we drove her back to the city. He isn't up to all the tricks of my only-half-working camera...
but I treasure this one all the same of the girls hanging out on the porch laughing and talking and talking and talking


We are not shaped by our future, but by our past which is shaped by our present!
Makes the moment we are in feel kinda sacred, doesn't it?!!


Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
Be acceptable in Your sight, O LORD, my rock and my Redeemer.
Psalm 19:14




Wednesday, August 26, 2020

Balancing Burdens...




To bear the weight of the woes of this world
Would drain us of all hope of happiness
To dwell on the darkness where Light unfurled
Beckons, is to miss God’s kind faithfulness

To suffer we must; but to hurt alone
Would surely be hardship’s most bitter part
The Lord does not leave us Comfortless, no
Though this world’s sorrows can shatter the heart

Worry is not the same thing as concern
Worry frets anxiously; futile and hard
Concern will caution, encourage, discern
Stand like a strong, loyal soldier on guard

Lord, help us daily Thy grace to employ
To bear life’s burdens with courage and joy

© Janet Martin 
 
1 Pet.5:6-7
Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, 
so that in due time He may exalt you.