Who Will Tell Our Children?

Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."

Matt.19:14

Who will tell them of a baby?

Born, from God in Bethlehem

Who will tell the precious story?

Who will tell our dear children?

Who will tell them of a Teacher

Friend of sinners, you and I

Who will tell how much He loves us

Who will tell how, why He died?

Who will tell them of a Savior?

Sacrificed upon a cross

Who will tell them how He suffered

To pay sin’s eternal cost

Who will tell the awesome story
How He triumphed death with life
Overcame the cross with glory
Hope Immortal crowns our strife

Who will tell them, we, dear Mother

We, dear dad with tender heart

For oh, who will tell our children

If we fail to do our part?

If we fail, pray who will tell them

Of Jesus who loves them so?

Who will tell our children’s children

If they don't know what they don't know?

© Janet Martin

Guess We All Needs a Bit o' Trouble

Gardening can be quite discouraging, especially when drought and blight join forces.

I was out just now, bemoaning the withered plants...

...when near to me lands a beautiful swallowtail butterfly!
Beauty midst broken...

Guess we all needs a bit o' trouble

To learn to be truly glad

‘Cause we would live in a bubble, love

If good days was all we had

Guess we all needs a bit o’ cryin’

To taste laughter’s sugar full-fold

An’ we all needs a bit o’ gray, darlin’

To appreciate the gold

Guess we all needs our share o’ losin’

To humbly receive a win

An' I guess if we gets too full o’ ‘gettin’

We all needs a punch on the chin

Guess we all would get lazy an’ fat

If we didn’t needs to work so hard

Guess we all needs trouble an’ that

To learn to trust in God

Guess we all wouldn’t learn to pray

If we had all that we wish

Guess we all needs to be more 'they'

An’ a little less selfish

We all needs to make a livin’, yep

But we should be givin’ a lot

‘Cause we all often needs each other’s he’p

'an each other is all we got

© Janet Martin

An' August Is...' Poem

 The first five days of August (I blinked and there they were!) served up a kaleidoscope of color!

August is a flower

August is a book

August is a lily-pad

Bordering the brook

August is a garden

In each dell and dip

August is a poem, love

Slipping from the lip

August is a rainbow

Caught in canning jars

August is a carefree girl

With eyes full of stars

August is a loafer

Pocket full of wish

August is an Artist

August is a fish

August is a peach pie

August is a boy

With gold-buttered freckles

Behind corn-buttered joy

August is a love song

August is a dash

Bare feet banter fading

Into silver splash

August is a wheat field

August is a door

Leading to a stair where

August is no more

© Janet Martin

August's Lemonade Days

Haze-lazy languor envelopes late-summer’s afternoon

The air is steeped with stippled blips of August cricket-tune

The flag droops, limpid; like the dog’s tongue where the rippling heat

Chases both breeze and straggler from the sidewalk and the street

The bloom wilts and the worker wishes it was five ‘o clock

The blue wave flattens in monotonous laps against the dock

The shade, a poor man’s palace, begs for iced bev’rage and books

And a sudden vacation from Duty’s most stringent looks

The morning is a steamboat chugging out across the bay

Beneath the yellow-cello-sun that strums a mellow lay

Toward twilight, a harbor blurred by sweat-anointed brow

And winter is a dreamland on a dear and distant prow

The locust buzzes in the silver-poplar citadel

The catfish lolls beneath the bridge where Johnnie’s fish-hook fell

The garden is a desert, deserted by hoe and spade

On these, the lazy, hazy days of August lemonade

© Janet Martin

Okay, so anyone with a garden knows that August days are not lazy, but we snatch mini-vacations when we can...a glass of lemonade in the shade, a quick look into a poetry book

and such-like:)

For What Still Waits To Be...

 Sometimes I think I can make muffins in my sleep, so common is this weekly-or-more-ritual...

 ...but suddenly it struck me how much has changed through my muffin-making years!
The home-from-school-hungry-boy is a young man leaving for work at 7:00 every morning...

...no more mom-can-you-take-me-pick-me-up?

Moms, let's cherish our modest 'mundanes' because nothing stays the same for long...

Nothing remains the same

 For all that seems to stay

Such as the wick that wears dawn’s flame

And twilight snuffs away

...such as rainbows that spill

From bud-anointed loom

To bloom a little bloom until

Its petals fill earth’s tomb

Such as each season-sweep

That flickers but a glance

With splendors that no one can keep

Save perhaps, second chance

Such as life’s give and take

The ache of hold-let-go

Such as the memories we make

From wakes that ebb and flow

The tasks that we perform

Without much thought are such

That they are guaranteed to fall

Beneath Time’s tireless touch

...for poetry of words

Cannot persuade the clock

To linger where the dust is stirred

By foot-loose Goldilocks

No, nothing stays the same

Save this, a common plea

That God will grant His strength and grace

For what still waits to be

© Janet Martin