Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Love's Testament




Sweet hour of dawn unfolding on the air
Its whisper spawning bird-song to the breeze
The dell, a sea of mist and memories
Rousing within the heart a wordless prayer
Here pain and pleasure mutely synchronize
Surging within like only love can do
Where hunger, having, holding, missing you
Alloy; a raw and tender paradise
And I will hold you just to taste the grief
Of letting go; its ache love’s testament
As joy and sorrow, the heart’s filament
Rends and mends in bittersweet relief
For joy alone or grief cannot exist
It mingles like the morning with the mist



Moments; oh, mighty, subtle, sheer deluge
Breathing to bloom the bud-let tightly clenched
Yet nature’s roving thirst is never quenched
Its force an unrelenting subterfuge
We stoop to trace the petals on the lawn
Mourning the haste at which the hours pass
The prophets understood ‘all flesh is grass’
Our sojourn like the mist upon the dawn
The heart, a chalice for life’s offering
Runs over with the gifts that life employs
We drink its bitter gall and honeyed joys
Its beauty and its sorrow-suffering
As love, a soulful, stirring melody
Inspires us to press on faithfully



Hope in an arabesque spiral of calm
Trembles anew upon the morning brink
We cannot touch the haze of muted pink
Nor can we clasp the moments in its palm
Yet, in this gossamer incline of Time
Goodness and mercy shod each gifted hurt
And thus we laugh, willing to kiss the dirt
And thus we weep; relinquishing its rhyme
To rivers rushing out to twilight’s edge
We cannot keep, but simply touch and taste
The silver mist of mercy’s moment-haste
Before they fall like seeds beneath the sedge
Yet oh, within its beck I’ve come to know
I hold to feel the hurt of letting go

© Janet Martin

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Standing on the Edge...of Eternity



"I don't like thinking about it. It makes my head hurt" said Victoria the other day as we tried to imagine the vastness of Eternity.

Brief Prelude





They flow, breath-whispers winnowing our days
Swift hours tinted with love’s sundry hues
A kaleidoscope of purple, pinks and blues
The golden-bronze, the scarlet autumn blaze
And here within its trial and error leap
Within its planting and its gathering
We bear life’s laughter and its suffering
Praying the Lord His faithful watch to keep
For this is a brief prelude to the Place
Where we will set aside earth’s wants and woes
How soft and keen its moment-measure flows
A vapor-rush of Love’s mercy and grace
Before we join the ranks gone on before
Into the fathoms of Forevermore

The dew upon the grass soon disappears
The fragrance of its gleam evaporates
This life is like a drop that dissipates
In quickened murmuring of days and years…

© Janet Martin

yes, that old quote is true; We grow too soon old and too late smart...


Where Heroes are Born...



 

 Image source and stories

It is not on a sweet,
Still,
Soft and
Peaceful
Coral morn
That this world’s heroes
Are born…

No, it is
In the hard-core
Life-and-death decisions
Of putting others before
Self
Where flesh is sacrificed, scarred
And torn
Here; this is where
Heroes are born

© Janet Martin

The pictures out of Oklahoma in the past few days are heart-wrenching!



Our prayers continue.

Monday, May 20, 2013

Beneath the Arch of Azure Sky...



Beneath the arch of azure sky
Against earth’s dappled green we lie
A little cloud, a little sun
And so another day is done

Beneath the arch of azure sky
The bud unfolds, then blooms and dies
A little rain, a little sun
And so another spring is done

Beneath the arch of azure sky
We join the moments drifting by
A little pain, a little fun
And so another life is done

Beneath the arch of azure sky
A mother hears her baby cry
A little rain, a little sun
For this new life that has begun

© Janet Martin

We never know what will be told
as this day's story-line unfolds
But this we know, in Whom we trust
To Him we yield our thoughts of dust...

My hearts and prayers are with the suffering in Oklahoma tonight! 

Lady Spring





There is no lady quite like you
You flaunt earth’s purest green and blue
You wear an apple-blossom crown
And flare your dandelion gown

There is no lady quite as fair
As she with lilacs in her hair
And stately tulips round her feet
Where soil and toil and wonder meet

There is no lady quite as dear
As she with petals in her tear
Earth laughs to see her dance and sing
Across the land; fair Lady Spring

© Janet Martin


Oh Love, from Whence Comest Thou?





Oh Love that formed us in Thy depth of holy thought and will
Oh Love that shed Thy blood upon Golgotha’s lonely hill
Oh Love that breathes Thy spirit into all who will believe
Oh Love, our sacred merit as Thy fullness we receive

Oh Love that gives us purpose for each task both great and small
Oh Love, faithful through ages while earth’s kingdoms rise and fall
Oh Love, of greater portion than our meager minds can grasp
Oh Love, faithful assurance as its Mystery we clasp

Oh Love, Alpha, Omega, the Beginning and the End
For who is more supreme than Thee, the sinner’s gentle Friend?
Oh Love, who taught Thee how to love; from whence was Thy lot cast?
Love transcends, beneath, above; ‘I AM the First and Last’

© Janet Martin

The university professor attempted to describe agape Love without God...and failed.

Of Flesh and Soul





The flesh is but the temple harboring the ageless soul
The pride of life a ripple where time’s quickened hours roll
And soon we set aside its boast to sleep beneath the sod
The flesh adheres, from dust to dust; the soul returns to God

The adjournment of mortal woe meets our mortal gaze
But the immortal none can know in full until that place
When we stand before God alone to receive our reward
And tardy pleas cannot atone for truth that we ignored

Grace opens wide its gate and mercy appeals patiently
The day of grace with our last breath and Time will dissipate
The flesh returns to dust; the soul meets God at Heaven’s gate

The gods of self and this old world are never satisfied
The God of Heaven spilled His blood; our ransom crucified
It is finishedLove supreme cries out for you and me

© Janet Martin