Death

When we exhale our final breath

Where will we waken in our death?

Young or old, rich or poor

All must pass through the same door

***

If God should open up our eyes

Revealing where our treasure lies

Would we find gems that cannot rust?

Or simply trophies made of dust

***

We pass this way but once

Unalterable truths remain

Grace is free; and we will never

Pass this way again

© Janet Martin

We have a plot of grave-stones next to our property ...

Wow, I wonder at the life stories buried there. It is from the era of the Civil War and a decade or two after.
Did you notice how young they are?
Death is no respecter of persons~

Intoxication of Moonlight

Yes, yes, she whispers

Deep beneath amber moon

Alas, the cold morning

Arises too soon

Limelight is not green

And to bask in its glow

Is like building a dream

On a sparse flake of snow

The intoxication

Of moonlight on your sigh

Is almost as powerful

As the tear in your eye

Wants and wishes
Are two shades of gray
I wish the moonlight
Would last through the day

J~

Painful Satisfaction

 

lostcoastdailypainters.blogspot.com

I could feign indifference

But what good would it do

To reconcile my mind to breathe

Without the thought of you

The shallow end of living

Lies among the puddles where

No sudden gales of longing

Sweep the heart from moonlit air

I could feign emotions

Walk the stringent law of word

But I prefer the oceans

That the thought of you has stirred

J~

Ark of Safety

Upon the shores of grace we stand

Where Time and Mercy plead

Before wrath’s flood will wash earth’s sand

Into eternity

The ark is built; the door ajar

And whosoever will

May come into its sure stronghold

Before Time’s clock stands still

As in the days of Noah; now

Because of unbelief

The Master waits; lengthens the hour

Before sin’s final grief

Today He pleads and suffers long

He beckons to each mortal

Eternity lays in His palm

Trembling on heaven’s portal

As in the days of Noah, He

Implores, yearns and beseeches

For this last Ark will not return

When He closes its reaches

Upon the shores of grace we kneel

Oh, how long will He tarry?

Before the door of Mercy seals

The seeker from its safety

© Janet Martin

This morning the little guy I babysit and I were looking at view-master reels. One reel was Noah’s Ark. One picture caught my breath…the last two animals…turtles,(cute:) were through the door and it was closing, never to open on this side of the flood.

Now we see another door, still open. When it will close, not even the angels know. Only the One True God…I AM knows the day and the hour...

Behold, now is “THE ACCEPTABLE TIME,” behold, now is “THE DAY OF SALVATION” 2 Cor.6:2

Because It Is Friday

Because it’s Friday

I will be seduced

By the long moment stretching

Beyond the window-pane

Where somewhere

Your feet

Are finding the trails

Ever leading

Home

Because it is Friday

I allow your whisper

To draw me from rigid details

Just to languish frivolously

In the rushing thought

Of your fingers

Rousing possibility

As unpolished stutters

Murmur a wanton

Reply

Because it is Friday

I will not dissuade

Tattered intentions

From washing up on unseen shores

Because it is Friday

And somewhere

In life’s trampled grasses

Hearts soar

Because it is Friday

Once more

© Janet Martin

Contemplating Moments from the Bank of a Brook

They hover momentarily

Infinite breaths of possibility

Before slipping over the edge

Joining the rush of weightless centuries

Past

Inexperience begins its lessons

In a fresh generation

Of eager-eyed adolescence

Greedy with desire to experience

Life

…and all I am able to do

Is marvel at our ability

To repeat its bitter mistakes

Even with history’s mirror of

Consequence

© Janet Martin

Manifold Mystery

What is the loveliness

You keep on your lips?

What scenes lay behind your closed eyes?

What do you ache for

In clenched finger-tips

What tunes your unspoken cries?

What draws your laughter?

What stirs your soul?

What weeps from inclines above?

What spawns the longing

That curses this world

Oh, do you think it is love?

***

What causes Him

To grant one more day

To a thankless and erring race?

What shapes His patience

Toward rebel-slaves

Addicted to sin’s vile disgrace

What tunes the mercy

That wakens the dawn?

What stirs His might from above?

What fills the vastness

Of centuries gone?

Oh, do you think it is love?

***

What forms desire?

Or then what fulfills it?

What is this double-edged sword?

What inflicts a wound?

But oh, then what heals it?

What is both race and reward?

What rends the heart

Like a lightning bolt

And yet is gentle as a dove?

What is this

Manifold mystery?

Oh, do you think it is love?

© Janet Martin

What is the loveliness

You keep on your lips?

What scenes lay behind your closed eyes?

What do you ache for

In clenched finger-tips

What tunes your unspoken cries?

What draws your laughter?

What stirs your soul?

What weeps from inclines above?

Beyond the longing

That curses this world

Oh, do you think it is love?

***

What causes Him

To grant one more day

To a thankless and erring race?

What shapes His patience

Toward rebel-slaves

Addicted to sin’s vile disgrace

What tunes the mercy

That wakens the dawn?

What stirs His might from above?

What fills the vastness

Of centuries gone?

Oh, do you think it is love?

But You Stayed...

…but you stayed

All soft and warm against me

In the promises we made

While Time and distance

Spread their ware

you stayed

against me in a prayer

J~

Beneath Winter's Flaxen Moon

We walk the frost-tipped eventide

On aisles of snow-bent grass

And crooked trees stretch shameless; wide

Their naked wantonness

The low moon falls against the lawn

Where frozen puddles lie

As twilight deepens its blue yawn

Inhaling remnant sky

It fans its thoughts on deadened air

And bends the earth into a prayer

Your breath is summer on my skin

Your fingertips, a hearth

Your lips, shaped in a soft half-grin

Bring heaven-thoughts to earth

The disrobed trees in clumsy truth

Our hidden wants descry

You take my longing in your mouth

And peel away the sky

The moon its subtle vesture spills

In silver blankets on the hills

The wind, a drifting troubadour

Croons a slow melody

It sweeps across night’s gleaming floor

In gallant chivalry

The little breadth of toil and tears

That stole away the noon

Dissolves like hazy yester-years

Beneath the flaxen moon

But we are not aware of things

As beggars taste the wine of kings

J~

Sun-down...

All day it hung
A polished orb
In heights of azure mirth
Til swiftly
and so silently
it fell beneath the earth
A fire-ball
of burnished orange
yet without much ado
it simply slipped
behind the woods
soundlessly out of view
All that it forgot to take
was a pink and purple lake...

Janet~

I intentionally waited to go for my run until sun-down.
I'm glad I did. The sun fell away in minutes
leaving a pink and gold wash in the atmosphere
before the blue twilight stole it away.