Of Being a Mother

• April's final PAD challenge; Two-for-two Tuesday
• Write a finished poem.
• Write a never finished poem.

It's the unendingness of it all that is staggering
Burden and beauty tenderly entwine
Soon little hands tug away from our reaching
Tendrils of new bloom twisting from the vine
And often we wander within the heart's pondering
Over the years that flow seamless and brief
Learning that labor-pain is but the dawning
Of love's keen travail in its tender-sweet grief
Vigilant caring and joy like no other
This is the labor of being a mother

First motherhood; virgin unawareness
Eager and ignorant; hope undefiled
Wails, now dependent on this girl-child woman
Laughing and weeping, she cradles her child
And we are forever in our bosom severed
We will never be who we were before
As fear and faith rival where innocence trembles
And motherhood places its wreath on our door
High, holy calling unlike any other
This is the charge of being a mother

Ecstasy, agony, holding, releasing
Heaven's allotment placed into our care
Tenderly teaching within our reaching
And earnest beseeching from hands clasped in prayer
For in the magnitude of love's great vocation
God  will not leave us like sheep in the wild
The Shepherd of mortal is faithful and patient
He holds the mother as she holds her child
Granting His mercy unlike any other
This is the comfort of being a mother

Janet Martin

I could never forgive myself for some of my mothering mistakes, but for the knowing that God forgives.

Of Renewed Aspiration

We touch our feet once more

To Time’s familiar way

Of ticking clocks and charted walks

And living’s scattered fray

The mist of life’s unknowns

May veil the hour’s will

But God beholds its ether folds

The pleasant and the ill

We touch our feet upon

Hope’s path of trampled dirt

For God abides where fear resides

In living’s lonesome hurt

Before the purple dusk

Enshrouds this little day

I pray that we live thankfully

And trust God for its way

© Janet Martin

Unnamed Elements

In onyx oceans of night you impress

Soft on my pillow and deep in my heart

Whispers of something I cannot caress

Murmur of yearning’s intangible art

Spring rends the air with desire and dreaming

Summer exhales to the garden its bloom

Autumn dons tresses of bronze-gilded gleaming

Darling, is winter heaven’s waiting room?

I cannot name this unspoken design

Where having and holding and hoping align

Time is a troubadour, ruthless and keen

Ageless, yet in its allotment of years

It unravels hours from gossamer skein

Kissing our faces with laughter and tears

We cannot see its outstretched fingers clasp

The delicate thread of mortality

Fading to naught; an ephemeral gasp

Before we step into eternity

But deeper than utterance in the heart’s crypt

Love pens its longing in thought’s shadow-script

Darkness cannot veil haunting heart-hunger

Arms cannot hold midnight moments of mist

We chased the wind too, when we were younger

For unnamed tidings that do not exist

Now, though our will in finest apparel

Touts golden wisdom, humbly we concede

Having and holding is the shallow temporal

Before heaven satisfies our last need

Darling, I love you and there is no shame

In bearing love’s longings that we cannot name

© Janet Martin

I am unable to upload photos right now due to technical problems.

Unrivaled Element

Love gives in gentle grace

What things cannot possess

For things are cold and commonplace

Against love’s kind caress

Its armistice endures

Unrivaled element

Of motive, perfect, patient, pure

And self-irrelevant

Love does not lose its nerve

Nor clings to greedy gain

Love gives and shares without reserve

From selfless founts within

Oh Lord, how great You are

Lord, there is none like you

You see the intent of our hearts

Yet love us through and through

© Janet Martin

Life's Bittersweet

So it goes, the river flows

In ripples to the sea

And moments course in half-breath force

Into eternity

Spring’s darling sheen of virgin green

Is nothing but the bud

Of autumn-rust to dormant dust

And leaf-song to the mud

…so it goes; Time will compose

And tenderly descry

With soundless beat Life’s Bittersweet

Of hello and good-bye

© Janet Martin

Perplexing Parallels

  

Image Source

New and Old align

The ‘perhaps’ with the done

And all things new are but the vine

With which the old is spun

The Old precedes the New

The new for its fine boast

Cannot replace the tried and true

Of things that matter most

From fancy’s faceless air

Deception weaves its trance

The newness of its untried fare

Entices us to dance

The staidness of the Old

Though lack-luster and bent

Has borne the test where New unfolds

Its shimmering content

Perplexing parallel

Experience and Youth

Yet New with footloose unfledged will

Cannot mutate Old Truth

© Janet Martin

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. Eccl. 1:9

Harbinger of May

April rushes in with her mop and broom

Splashing the landscape of starched umber-gray

Washing the bleak world of winter’s foray

Smiling then scolding, she sweeps through each room

Billowy breezes, refurbishing rain

Rinsing and fluffing, industrious mirth

Flinging wide sashes and shutters of earth

Troubadour armed with May’s flower-refrain

April, oh maiden of moody melee

Vexing the tulip with winter’s recoil

Testing, perplexing the planter of soil

Singing and laughing and weeping with glee

April, fair maiden of dexterous touch

Harbinger of lilacs, daisies and such

© Janet Martin

Today we are finally getting a taste of April's warmer side!

The Pleasantness of You Against my Thought

 

The pleasantness of you against my thought

Makes sweet the hours that otherwise are not

Winter’s despair is gentled by the show’r

Bathing the bud and nudging it to flow’r

We could collect life’s failure and its woe

But darling, tell me, what good would it do?

I choose the pleasure of the touch of you

The past is done; none can its threads undo

The future, with its muted mystery

Does not adhere to the heart’s fantasy

The pleasantness of you against my thought

Redeems the sullen void of what is not

Worry and woe align their hopeless schemes

Attempting to dismantle the heart’s dreams

The raw and useless curse of sad regret

Employs its demons, ah, lest I forget

But then, like mercy’s misty morning dew

I reach to touch the gentle thought of you

The imminence of all that yet is not

Cannot compete with you against my thought

© Janet Martin