The Substance of Things Hoped For...

The substance of things hoped for in the budded brogue of spring

Reveals its evidence in recompense of bronze and gold

The death of summer-long lies buried in September’s sting

Of rainbow-colored gardens spawned from small seed’s thunderous hold

The landscape is a picture of harvest half-gathered in

Where seed and deed have much in common; what we plant we reap

And we cannot afford to ignore harvest-heavy skin

Its mortal mist of Moment hinges to Unfathomed Deep

The faith we plant among the thorn and scorn of disbelief

Like seeds will, without fail prove what is good and pure and true

The substance of things hoped for in this life of strife and grief

Abides in spite of time’s much mulled and unexplained ado

Then pray, the purpose of our push and pull and heave and groan

With all its brief appointments of present soon ever-past

Is for far more than avatars of crumbling skin and bone

But Substance of things hoped for before Evidence at last

© Janet Martin

 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Heb.11:1

Better Than Pen-Poetry

Somehow the thoughts I think tonight

Mere poetry cannot corral

Release of ink inept to write

Its relief in a madrigal

The world that aches beneath my skin

Where wars of faith and fear hope, dread

Ignite a hunger-storm within

Like waves that surge and break, blood-red

Sometimes ink cannot mediate

The ways of love’s there-of and such

Nor can Poetry compensate

With offerings of type-print touch

My dear, the world at night can be

A black expanse of brooding air

A pen is maudlin company

When I am here and you are there

Prayer reaches through the dark with ease

God hears the words I cannot say

For He can translate tongue-tied pleas  

Into miracles when I pray

...and suddenly, my dearest dear
You do not seem so far from me
The transport of whisper and tear
Is love's sacred soul-poetry

© Janet Martin

 I will love You, O Lord, my strength.

The Lord is my rock 

and my fortress 

and my deliverer;
My God, 

my strength, in whom I will trust;
My shield 

and the horn of my salvation, 

my stronghold. 

 I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised;
So shall I be saved from my enemies.

Ps.18:1-3

Gray September, Saturday Dawn

 I LOVE to clatter about the kitchen on a rainy morning...

...listening to the tune of silver-circle notes

Gray dawn is like a shawl

It wraps Saturday souls

In thoughts of woolly sweaters

Cups of tea and book-cajole

Gray dawn is a like a yawn

September-sweet and slow

It tickles us with fancy’s feet

And second cups o’ joe

Gray dawn is like a song

A blue-some serenade

Rain-drop percussion back-drop to

A week of mem’ries made

Gray dawn is like a poem

Stirring from common stuff

A canticle of home, sweet home

And pots and pans and love

© Janet Martin 

 

Of Summer Almost Spent...

 I felt a sudden, strange kinship to these bowed blooms...

The art of summer almost spent

Teases the heart with discontent 

For in its vent of green and gold

We sense anew what none can hold

…and often pause, soft torn between

The laws of hope and what has been

Past’s dynasty of dormant years

Like empires built on sweat and tears

The salt of it still stings the tongue

…we didn’t feel, when we were young

How suave love’s raw bravado seals

Life’s Brigadoon to yester-reels

Or how the touch of thought can stir

Remembrances of him or her

Before the roar of stilly night

Or slip of day drew them from sight

The blue sky wears fretwork of green

…soon autumn’s red and gold will wean

The tree of easy lilt and sigh

To silhouettes of days gone by

The art of summer almost spent

Becomes a burnished testament

Of laughter-laden echoes strewn

Like husks on a lost afternoon

© Janet Martin

Wishing you a Saturday full of wonder in unexpected places:)

In The Case of Too Much Awe...Or Sympathy

Stunning moon-rise but its thrill was dimmed by what the lens picked up by shifting a few inches, through a gap in the trees...a major dairy-barn fire at a farm down the road...

This fire has been raging for a few hours now.

 Fire-fighters work at protecting near-by house and shed!

I hope everyone is okay!

Sometimes words fail

Too much awe

Too much 

Sympathy

Then what we say

 Is between us and God

As He hears the hearts

Of you and me

Janet~

Update: 

Allow Me, Said The Morning...

Allow me, said the morning as she gently took my hand

Today, because no one has been here is a foreign land

And I, fresh from the touch of God cannot contain my joy

Where hope’s cup runneth over with new moments to employ

Ah, let me introduce you (before shadows intercede

And dusk becomes the fellow that draws shut what dawn decreed)

To this anointing readied, not by mortal mien, but God

And how its grant is steadied by far more than shores of sod

Hark to the melody that tumbles from heaven to earth

Where dark is never deeper than ‘ahoy’ of new day’s birth

See, how the worth of what we do is more than gold or fame

But all about the love whereby we tender our claim

Surely goodness and mercy reigns, not fear and hate and doubt

From hill and hollow, rill and plain weather-veined legions shout

Earth rings with praise to He whose grace succours the eastern brim

Allow me, said the morning, to join you and worship Him

© Janet Martin

Another last-day-of-the-work-week hails! 

What do you plan to do before this last-Friday-before-Fall is folded forever?

After I bake a carrot cake for Dad’s 75th birthday celebration tomorrow night 

I hope to work outside this whole sunny, summer day long!

Wishing you a wonder-full whatever-this-day brings! 

p.s. Don't forget to walk in the moonlight tonight. It promises to be a BIG one(moon, that is:)!