'Child' ...In Reply To Garth Brook's Song 'Mom'

 Matt, straight out of bed this morning said, 'hey mom, I want you to hear this new awesome song from Garth Brooks!' He grinned as I listened with tears...tears of both joy and grief as I think about how many times I mess up in my 'leading them back to Him' and of joy because nothing comes close to the 'I love you Moms' uttered in countless ways...

When you came from heaven

Little girl or boy

You became the reason

For your mother’s joy

All her other dreams, child

Suddenly came true

Nothing could prepare her

For the likes of you

When you came from heaven

Suddenly her world

Took on a new meaning

In wee boy or girl

All life’s other charges

Would be reconciled

None quite as important

As her little child

Slip-and-stumble sorrow
Trip-and tumble crawls
Learning as she teaches
Reaching as she falls
Faith, fear and forgiveness
Tendering their art
Rendering joy’s fullness
Deep within her heart

When you came from heaven

Heaven came to her

Love took on new meaning

In the word Mother

And nothing could prepare her

For its sweetest sum

Just to hear her children

Say, I love you, mom

© Janet Martin

That saying is so true about a mother holding her children a short time in her arms but forever in her heart...

Dayle talks about another aspect of 'mother and child' here.

and here...

Mother said to God

I’m kinda scared

I feel so small

And unprepared

So much to teach them

As they grow

I’ve never been

A mother, you know

They'll need a lot

Of love and care

I’m gonna need

A lot of prayer

God said to mother,

What you say is true

But you’re not alone

I’ll walk with you

© Janet Martin

On Learning How to Fly

 

 Poem Tryouts with Margo

Expectation can grease you down hard

You forget about things

Like wings

And when you try to remember, the ground

Seems strangely sticky

With strings

We are too young to be old too soon

And fold our dreams

Up tight

Faith can feel over-sized ‘til we rise

Above the fear

Of flight

© Janet Martin

Moment-minuet

Hemlock and pine strum the strings of adieu

Darkness embraces dusk’s vulnerable blue

Here a wee quiver and there a wee sigh

Day is a shimmering tear in time’s eye

Lullaby softens noon’s sun-polished lilt

Muffling its laughter with  star-studded quilt

Where on still-silvery sedges thought hears

Satin-soft slippers as time disappears

Midnight, the mien of beginning and end

Touches time’s timbrel like stranger and friend

Tomorrow becomes what yesterday was

Present succumbs to Past’s deepening pause

Leviathans of mankind’s love and lust

Crumble to eons of ashes and dust

As, ever hastening days become years

Breath-by-breath chastening; time disappears

Hail to the piper of viperous flute

Grasp at the strain of refrains growing mute

Dance to the violin’s quivering lay

On ether oceans drip-dripping away

Beg not for plunder of miserly dirt

But beg for wonder because moments flirt

Momentarily; silk, sixteenth-note spheres

Flowing through fingers where time disappears

© Janet Martin

The Fellowship of Green and Blue

Click on image to enlarge...

The fellowship of green and blue

Or white, is good for me and you

And we can learn a thing or three

Within the honest company

Of wide-flung skies and friendly breeze

That stirs kind whispering of trees

They do not bother to repeat

Those things less kind or true or sweet

Its shade is free and equal, for

We are all people, nothing more

No invitation needed, just

A purposed sort of wanderlust

To walk a thoroughfare of sod

And talk without a word to God

A tree does not ask for a name

Or judge the place from whence we came

It spreads its arms with charm sincere

And beckons us, come here, come here

Where time enough pulls out a chair

And fills our cups with pure, fresh air

The sky has open, honest eyes

It wears no pretense or disguise

The wild-bloom none can own or boast

Nor fence it in with chain and post

And I think everyone would be

More like the sky or bloom or tree

If we, instead of push and rush

And blame, would listen where the hush

Of nature bears an attitude

Of patience; Earth is never rude

© Janet Martin

Für 'The Loves of My Life'

I want to greet you with pleasure each morning

Until night kisses the long-shadow lea

I want to touch you with love, oh my darling

Who knows when you will be taken from me?

Time is a treasure worth spending; love’s tears

Water a garden where memories grow

I want to touch you soft, slow, oh my dears

For when a bloom falls away, who can know?

I want to wander with you more often

Season-songs hasten like Beethoven’s best

Over the arc of noon, soon skies soften

Tugging another flower to its rest

Come, let love’s cup of laughter run over

Come, for tomorrow holds no guarantee

All that we have is Today, each other

Let’s make it a beautiful memory

© Janet Martin

For my friends, Glynis and Rosemary who lost a dear sister suddenly last week,
and for the rest of us and those we hold dear.