Leap Day

 At IGWRT they ask these questions today...

What color is your morning?
What are the shapes of your day?
What are the smells of your evening?
What are the textures of your favorite piece of clothing?
What are the sounds you hear right now?
What nourishes you?
What do you see when you open your eyes and really look?

 Play by play on Leap Day unfolding...

Gray arms cleave to Mother Earth

Dawn offers a bleak embrace

As ice tears dash her frozen turf

Coffee sings amazing grace

Obliterating dull despair

In amber sunshine on my tongue

Dear daughter dangles from my chair

As she observes how ‘poem’ is done

And then she’s off in twirls and whirls

Of Sunkist orange and sock-feet glee

Thank-you God, for little girls

I inhale simplicity;

The scent of wood-smoke from the fire

The flail of axe as son splits wood

The arguments of sibling ire

Life is good, life is good

Weather man forecasts cold rain

Red flannel smiles, warm fingers touch

Chocolate cake pulled from the oven

I don’t mind the cold too much

Oom-pa-pa notes dip and dive

Piano lessons cannot wait

Oh, it’s good to be alive

‘Snow day’ mornings sure are great

© Janet Martin

I wrote this poem as the moments played out…

The kids have a 'snow day'...no school. 

I realized to keep up with Victoria as she flits about the house is a whole separate poem!

Matthew split the wood, started a fire, then I told him he may bake his favorite chocolate cake and we’ll have ‘leap day’ cake for supper.

Roots

To teach a child morality

With no Base for its stand

Is like trying to plant a tree

On shores of shifting sand

Our eyes behold but half the tree

Though towering are its reaches

It is the Base we cannot see

Securing storm-tossed branches

The whole of moral law consists

Not only by instruction

But by a hidden measuring stick

That justifies law’s judgment

How can we teach a child of love

And yet deny its Giver?

Love has a Source man cannot prove

Without a Higher Power

How can we teach morality

Or fool-proof absolutes

And yet ignore the Deity

That gives the Law its roots?

© Janet Martin 

As I watch the wind bending the trees I marvel at their strength...

...the trunk never moves though the branches are thrashed in the gale.

And yet it is not the trunk which keeps it there. It is the part we cannot see.

The trees survival depends on the surety of the roots. If the roots are healthy and True the tree will stand.

It spawned a train of thought as I looked at my kids (snow day again) and I began to wonder how their 'roots' are developing. Will they hold fast in the storm's of life?

Time Enough or A Housewife Rebels

Time enough for mundane dues

The sun has flung a yellow wash

Across the earth; dull avenues

Transform beneath its gilded sash

And I must leave these bland confines

Of ginger-spice and lemon soap

Of laundry-poems with endless lines

The breeze, a gentle calliope

Strums eagerly the jeweled limb

It beckons to me from the air

As nature’s azure, lilting hymn

Seeps through the window to my chair

Where Duty with austere command

Points me to pots and pans and broom

But a kind stranger tugs my hand

And lures me to earth’s grand ballroom

Where now silk threads have teased the sun

To dim her golden smile a bit

For soon another day is gone

And soon the evening star is lit

For even now the pale white ghost

Of crescent moon dangles aloft

Before the sun has thought to coast

Beneath the western skyline’s croft

Time enough for mundane dues

Today offers no repeat chance

On lengthened shadow avenues

Kind stranger, may I have this dance?

© Janet Martin

…and so we did

On Waiting...

We cannot rush the unfolding of a flower

Or improve upon its flawless, fragile bloom

We cannot hasten minutes through an hour

To by-pass lessons in life’s waiting room

We cannot hurry seasons or extend them

The naked tree must wait for spring’s consent

We cannot form God’s preordained perfection

But we can trust and wait…and be content

© Janet Martin

 Wait on the LORD: be of good courage,
and he shall strengthen your heart:
 wait, I say, on the LORD. Ps. 27:14

I Wonder...

If I am the only ‘Jesus’

That some will ever see

I wonder what they think of Him

As they meet Him through me

If I profess to take His name

Wherever I may go

I wonder if they think of Him

As One they’d like to know

Janet~

Like Pipe-smoke on a Sultry Summer's Eve

You weave

through my senses

I’m entranced

by your lips
as they brush

my thought
in an ethereal kiss

and memories murmur,

a spiraling blush

into the dense
warm twilight hush

like pipe-smoke

on a sultry summer's eve
your presence
evokes
memories

softly, you weave

your way to me

over cumbersome answers

with questions never breathed,

truth cementing
fact into place

Still, I remain
touching your face

reluctant to call it a day

though moments pelt

the deepening silver-gray
like snowflakes melt
they fade away

into history’s expanding clutch
without tangible touch

Oh, it’s strange

how thought can stray

needing no map

to guide its way
across oceans
of twilight nothingness
to you...

J~

 http://sundaywhirl.wordpress.com/

Mini-vacation

There are no maps

To direct me

No highways to follow

No hills to climb

But I can find you

With my eyes closed

Destinies of the heart

Are traveled

Through the mind

J~

The Onset of Things to Come

The dawn has spread, four hours deep

Across the thinning sky

Illusive ghosts of midnight creep

Beyond its waning eye

And on the cusp of things to come

With mystic fingertips

God’s grace unfolds a sacred bloom

As morning parts its lips

Inhale the nectar of His hope

Love bleeds miraculously

As Time exhales a transient scope

Of opportunity

And on the cusp of things to come

Another day begins

Mercy imparts from lofty Throne

Forgiveness for our sins

Beneath our feet a stepping-stone

Of moments yields its path

Leading into life’s vast unknown

From history’s aftermath

Ephemeral vapor on Time’s tongue

This brief reality

What was

What is

And is to come

Before

Eternity

© Janet Martin

Abiding Treasure

The beauty of a word remains

Long after youth’s ephemeral dance

Or its passive and pleasant glance

The beauty of a word remains

Speak to me that treasure then

Far better it than transient fray

For when I am old and gray

I will smile with pleasure, then

Some strive for fame and fortune’s gold

Dross does not leave the spirit stirred

But oh, the splendor of a word

Is such a wondrous thing to hold

The beauty of a word remains

Long after youth’s ephemeral gasp

It will soothe our wanton clasp

The beauty of a word remains

J~

Fulfilled

Lord, let me never want for naught

The things that you have deemed not mine

In every moment, deed and thought

Not for a neighbor's blessing pine

Lord, teach me how to live and love

And never disregard my lot

Because of what I do not have

As in some greener field I sought

A thousand, thousand blessings, Lord

Daily pass before my gaze

In every thought, action and word

May I live to give You praise

© Janet~

My Mother

Queen of the mending basket

And stretching a dollar

And loving ten children

Each the best

My mother

Eye of an artist

Heart of a poet

Hands of a farmer

Patience of Job

My mother

The butcher, the baker

The tireless meal-maker

The gardener, landscaper

The seamstress and quilter

The tutor and teacher,

The nurse, the maid

The most beloved

Mother

Her name is Grace~

© Janet Martin

I'm thinking about my mom today (snow-day with MUCH noise)

and I am realizing once again what an amazing mom I had as I grew up,

and wondering how she did it....often humming as she cooked supper.

She is still amazing...(almost 70) and tirelessly serving wherever there is a need.