Mercy Replies

 These pics only capture a whim of this morning's sunrise in full glory...

God has grand ways of getting our attention!

Touched by a light that hath no name
A glory never sung
Aloft on sky and mountain wall
Are God's great pictures hung...

Excerpt from John Greenleaf Whittier's poem Sunset on the Bear Camp

Dawn splays a backdrop of splendor to moments

Above time’s torment Faithfulness appears

As long as earth remains there will be morning,

Mercy renewed in the flight of night’s spheres

Star-seas unravel; we marvel as darkness

Beneath the gavel of grace yields its might

Love pours through eons in infinite pardon

Choirs of laughter rend dungeons with Light

Uplifted faces glimpse traces of Heaven

Ah, what is man that we should Thus behold?

Morning replies with skies utterly riven

Mercy replies with eyes poured full of gold

Dawn splays a backdrop of awe to earth’s stages

Where man fills ages with struggle-and-cope

Volume on volume of God-Mercy wages  

On our behalf threading pages with hope

© Janet Martin

A Poet's Thank-you~

Thank-you for the pictures that will never leave thought's whispers

Thank-you for the smile that stirs the heart in spite of years

Thank-you for the vow that once-upon-a-time you made me

Thank-you for the poetry that has no words...but tears

Thank-you for the memories and all the inspiration 

Thank-you for a paradise that never disappears

Thank-you for the labyrinth of laughter and vexation

Thank-you for the poetry that spills its verse... in tears

Thank-you for the place that nothing can erase, save dying

Thank-you for the invitation to brave private fears

Thank-you for the answers to the heart-prayers I've been crying

Thank-you for the poetry that found its way...through tears

Janet~

November Lullaby

Now etched on twilight’s slumb’ring sigh

November croons a lullaby

In hues of blues and blushing gray

It tucks the little day away

Goodnight, noon’s bustling boulevard

Sleep tight, earth’s silver-white post-card

And hush-a-bye, wee girl and boy

Clear-calm thy sea of dreams, ahoy

Now weeps the wandering wind, alone

Like vagabond without a home

He shakes November’s naked bough

And sweetens home-sweet-home somehow

Goodnight, sage cot of bud and bloom

Sleep tight, daydreamer's living-room

And hush-a-bye, leaf-swaddled dell

Earth slips into the sky... Farewell,

© Janet Martin

Somehow, when November’s wind rattles at windows and doors

I am reminded of all the simple things I’m thankful for.

Grappling With Kisses

We carry on, though Time rakes fingers hard against our skin

And we remember better the person we are within

Than they who stare with stranger’s eyes at us who stare right back

To test modern-day pioneers foraging Unknown’s track

…of forward march and Time with hungry eyes spares no surprise

As what we thought we knew evolves and readjusts our sighs

We carry on, for what else can anyone do, but this?

A band of fellow-travelers at the mercy of Time’s kiss

© Janet Martin

Last night I attended a meeting on Memoir Writing.

As I listened to guests voice their reasons for wanting to write a memoir I came to the conclusion that we are all grappling with the potency of Time’s kiss, by God's grace...
 

Consummate Charmer

PAD Challenge day 19: For today’s prompt, write a thing poem. 

You are not much to look at

And yet, you stir in me 

Passion, allure, 

You hold a world

Of Possibility

Of flowered slope

Of hunger

Hope,

Of dreamer's paradise

How is it, you, 

Common and plain

Flirts with I-want-you-eyes 

And I, completely willing

Cannot 

Fight your straight-laced charm

But 

Like a lonely woman

I grasp your pro-offered arm

...and then we dance

A strange romance

For you follow my lead

Where I, 

A poet,

You, 

A pen

In consummate  

Rhyme,

Bleed

~Janet Martin

The Painter's Pot

How free is thought, a painter’s pot

To tease the half-poised brush

Where air is charged with verse at large

And unpenned poems rush

A potent stream of hope-pray-dream

And this, the poet’s task

Where eons splay to snare a ray

From time’s unstoppered flask

How deep the sky where poet’s fly

How ink-betrothed, their flight

No paradise of thoughtless sighs

To appease day or night

But with a thirst, half-blessed, half-cursed

On phantom wings they rise

To raid the stars and boulevards

That bard alone descries

Amethyst, pink, turns into ink

The balladeer of pen

Dare not despise whispered war-cries

Which writhe beneath the skin

Where want-of-verse and taunt immerse

To spar with thought and jot

As poets shape their no-escape

From this; the painter’s pot

© Janet Martin

Careful Then

'Wow, what a lot of passion preserved in print on pages' I marveled as I cleaned my poetry-cupboard yesterday. 'and this but a teeniest drop in an ocean of books'.

Print-preserved,

Down through the ages

Is thought’s passion

Pressed to pages

Careful then

What fingers bleed

Where years and years

From now They read

© Janet Martin