The NAANI

Poetic Bloomings invites us to try writing a NAANI

The NAANI is one of India’s most popular Telugu forms,  Naani means “expression of one and all.”  It consists of 4 lines, totalling 20 to 25 syllables. It is generally untitled, although the subject may be inferred in the first line. The poem is not bound to a particular subject, but is often about human relations. The form was introduced by one of the renowned Telugu poets, Dr. N. Gopi.

 

While I tally

My scores of failure

She climbs into my arms

Hugs me and falls asleep

***

The television does not

Drown out the silence

Yet, newspaper walls

Can be impenetrable

***

Yesterday, today, forever

He IS, the only Way,

The only Truth

And Door to eternal life

***

Darkness thickens stealthily

In countless layers

But one tiny flame

Dispels its utter blackness

Janet~

Of Hidden Tempests...

Clark Little Photography...

Against the shoreline of my thought

Your ceaseless whispers swell

No pious benediction

Will its timeless surging quell

Well-rehearsed intonation

Melts unnoticed on the hour

But raw untried emotion

Clutches me within its power

The ebb and flow of moments

Tunes the timbre of a sea

Surging in a mammoth ocean

Somewhere deep inside of me…

J~

Mountain-climbing

To reach the top

We are guaranteed

Darling, I know if we keep climbing

To give up or to stop

To release you

It never was my intention

I struggle upward and pray

From vows of my youth

Dangling precariously

While moments slip away

Gripping the truth

I cling tenaciously

So when it comes to us

Love weathers all weather

And when it comes to the heart

When it comes to love

Than to be apart together

I prefer to be together apart

Not compelling resistance

I release the hour

That is the way of love

Without creating distance

Expanding history

Moments push between us

© J~

Hello down here…are you confused? Congratulations! You just read this poem backwards…we are mountain-climbing so we must begin at the bottom(as with all things in life:) and work our way up! I felt like having a little fun:)

No Wasted Days

As long as love

Fills the heart

There will be no empty days

As long smiles

Adorn our mouths

There will be no darkest days

As long as duty

And desire blend

There will be no futile days

As long as you

Remain my friend

There will be no wasted days

Janet~

Pour Me Another...

The poetic notion of over and done

For me, has ceased to exist

The aching essence of love lingers on

Like the afterglow of a kiss

Memory is like vintage wine

We savor its warmth on our lips

Today’s moments are fruit on a vine

Tomorrow its harvest we sip

 I hold the aura of you on my tongue

Its ambiance soothing my thought

Forever old or forever young

To me it matters not

For the poetic notion of over and done

Is for moments, not memories

Pour me another; love lingers on

In moments such as these

The fingers of time run over my skin

Darling, what must will be

Time cannot touch moments sealed within

The vault of memory

J~

In Poetry

Because I am a lover of simple things

I find great allure in the translucent strings

On which a tender thought is hung

And thus, a legacy is strung

In poetry

Because I am a lover of simple things

I am content as the robin sings

And the green unfurls on distant slope

And suddenly the world is a beacon of hope

In poetry

Because I am a lover of simple things

I love the pleasure too lowly for kings

As I pause in a meadow of ten-thousand suns

Lifting their exuberance to everyone

In poetry

Because I am a lover of simple things

The music of heaven unceasingly rings

In a calliope of present then past

As I hold the treasure of a memory fast

In poetry

Because I am a lover of simple things
I thank God daily for the mercy He flings
In nameless moments of intangible verse
...of hope and love as thoughts immerse
In poetry

© Janet Martin

Mother's Day Thoughts...

Oh, that my life would be

A humble, loving legacy

When time and life have slipped from me

…their Mother

What will my children say

On some distant Mother’s Day

As they recall their childhood play

…and Mother?

Will the unyielding sod

Not quell the path I trod

Because they learned of God

…from Mother?

And will my memory

Somehow thread tenderly

Through generations still to be

…of a godly Mother?

Oh, that my life would be

A humble, loving legacy

When time and life have slipped from me

…their Mother

© Janet Martin

Yesterday morning at church an elderly gentleman shared memories of his mother, long gone and suddenly I wondered what my kids memories will be when they are asked to share something about their mother...

They do not know

as I draw them to me

of the tug-of-war beauty

surging in me

and they do not know

that I fight back aching tears

realizing suddenly

how the thief of years

snatches vapor-moments

from longing fingertips

turning wee girls to women

as time ceaselessly slips

from the before to the after

covering the ground

with the joy of love's laughter

and the tender-sweet sound 

when the night is quiet

on the mist-tinted air

...I hear a song hovering

of a rocking chair

As I held wisps of heaven

in the dark, stilly-deep

While rocking and humming

my babies to sleep...

 

Chosen Generation

We are not just ‘playing house’

As we toil and plant earth’s sod

But we are treading moments

On a stairway up to God

We are not just biding time

Twixt rise and set of sun

But we will give account to Him

For every deed we’ve done

We are not flesh shadows

Skimming time’s brief, pallid glance

Nor drifting flukes of nature

Victim’s of circumstance

But we are precious creatures

Born with a living soul

For whom our pure Creator died

So that we may be whole

And we are born with purpose

Not meaningless off-spring

In a field of dandelions

We are children of a King

...born in His wondrous image

Knit together by the touch

Of a tender heavenly Father

Who loves us very much

© Janet Martin

 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. Gen. 1:27

 

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 1 Peter 2:9

For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.

For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. ^{John 3:16-17}