September's Eve.....

You crept in early this eve; the night
A blanket of blue across the daylight
Stealthily exchanging in your subtle way
The gold fields of noon for meadows of grey
And only a brave little cricket or two
Were there to bid this day adieu

You are a silent and glorious thief
Chilling the summer heart with your grief
Yet stirring the soul with autumnal senses
A passion unbridled and void of defenses
I savor the blend of gentle and brusque
A lone spectator on the brink of dusk

Here in the stillness I sadly descry
The hem of sweet summer rustling by
I reach out to touch her silky train
The elusive essence of a misty rain
But she turned……once…..to smile at me
In empathetic sympathy

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Janet Martin

I Love You....

What does this really mean?
There’s the instant worship of seventeen
There’s a love that is kindled by beauty’s caress
In the rapture of youth and the Enchantress
There is love of innocence and fantasy
The perfect dream of what love will be…
The love that is fed by absence’ desire
Silent tears shed at a lonely fire
There is love of family, love of friends
And love to withstand all that this life sends
There’s the love of a mother, the love of a wife
The love of each other and the love of life
There is passion and sorrow and heart-wrenching bliss
There’s pain and hunger in an absent kiss
There is love penned in sonnets and poetry
Of love that was and that will be
There’s the loveliness of youth and the beauty of years
As fancy becomes truth in loves laughter and tears
I love you; sweet at the beginning, but sweeter my friend
If love remains true to the very end
After the wooing and after the strife
Love is the crown of an honorable life
I love you; now tell me, tell me true…
Aren’t you glad it ended with……..you?
Ah love, methinks you will ever be
Life’s sweetest, most anguishing mystery

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Janet Martin

Portraits of September

It’s coral dawn and magenta dusk
It’s arm of brawn and sigh of musk
Its ruddy fruit where blossoms fell
Shadows taunting from the dell
Azure noon and purple night
Ribbon of amber and green respite
Beneath a warm and slumbering sky
As clouds like ships go drifting by
Its dusty pink and muted hue
It is every shade of blue
It’s warm and sweet at four p.m.
Its perfect peace on twilight’s hem
Its mellow sorrow in a cup
Take the chalice and drink it up

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Janet Martin

These are portraits of my
September day…….
And evening.
I left for a walk when the sun was bright
But returned in the glow of a turquoise twilight

Until Rivers Run Dry.....

When I told you I’d love you till the rivers run dry
Or until no star twinkles in heavens vast eye
When I purposed within me to always be true
I had no concept of the words ‘I love you’

When love was a child it was carefree and blind
A beautiful wild flower kissed by the wind
We plucked its fair measure with careless delight
Enjoying its pleasure as a well-deserved right

But love cannot stay forever young
Sooner or later the raging tides come
And love must decide whether it will be true
Until rivers run dry and a lifetime is through

And then, only then will we truly know
If our love is enough for life’s ebb and flow
For love isn’t love at its very best
Until it is tried and has conquered the test

When I told you I’d love you till the rivers run dry
I say it again with a tear in my eye
For love is a river running wild and deep
And love is a promise I intend to keep

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Janet Martin

Almost Fall.....

Beautiful, dreamy dust-scented day
Sprawled ‘neath a blanket of purple and gray
Seduction of pleasure and melancholy
Intended for picnics and poetry
You tempt me to love you the best of all
No longer summer, you are ‘almost fall’

Caught in the drone of mid-afternoon haze
I revel in summer’s relinquishing ways
A dance between dawn, fanning ‘cross the sky
Ere she droops on the shoulder of the deep evening sigh
While earth dons her faded and weary shawl
Camouflaged, jaded and ‘almost fall’

Beautiful smoldering, tender torment
Lingering sadly in summer’s lament
Capsule of sweetness, you ravish and tease
While I taste a hint of farewell on the breeze
Lady in waiting, most stunning of all
Blue days of surrender in ‘almost fall’

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Janet Martin

Harbinger of Fall.....or September

The North Star gleams like a silver stud
On your navy, velvet vest
As with deft hands you softly draw
The green leaf from her nest
Where she securely lived her days
Beneath the summer sun
And lulled the night with whispered lays
And sighed within the dawn

Then you bestow your hoarded shades
Of red and golden-bronze
Upon each limb you deck the glades
In amber under-tones
Too long the evergreen has reigned
You tease the roving eye
With hints of orange and crimson strain
In summer’s lullaby

The azure vaults of endless bliss
You mute with hints of gray
And with your soft and smoky kiss
You steal the blue away
No more the aimless wanderer
The cloud that passes by
She wears a heavy woolen shirt
And moody is her sigh

Where blossoms loitered in the dell
And grapes upon the vine
We wander where the petals fell
Dreaming of autumns wine
The sun wears a defeated smile
I call her lovely still
But I know in a little while
She’ll yield to autumn’s chill

You are a subtle traveller
And I just cannot know
Should I address you then as Sir?
Are you a friend or foe?
A tremor in the midnight air
Reveals your true intent
Your are autumns harbinger
For summer came………and went

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Janet Martin

Us.....

These are the whispers that wash over me
Trickling in sonnets of sweet memory
Wait just a minute, ah, there you go
Soundless emission to time’s ceaseless flow
As laughter and teardrops and days in the sun
Pleasure and sorrow emerge as one
Handclasps and heartache and what will be….was
In each simple memory …..of us

These are the treasures I ponder and keep
Oh, how I chuckle and oh how I weep
Love, you are comrade yet sometimes a foe
While I’m holding on I am letting go
As sweetness and sorrow are vivid and keen
And the glow of tomorrow is yesterday’s sheen
Painful and precious and perfect because
It is the story……… of us

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Janet Martin

Progress?

Of all the progress of the age
And wonders of technology
Yet there is naught that can assuage
A broken-hearted memory

They may send man up into space
And view the earth from outer spheres
But there is naught that can erase
The pain bled out in silent tears

For though the centuries may roll
And man invents the latest ‘new’
Still there is naught to bring to whole
A heart that lies broken in two

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Janet Martin