With Honor and Awe

 Feeling a little blah? Read Psalm 119

It renews purpose with honor and awe

Sometimes we forget in life's bustle and sigh

The Awesomeness of by-and-by

Lord, would that we with what we have, be diligent and true

That we would recognize the gravity of say-and-do

That we will not be shifty, careless, lazy and slipshod

Remembering that our master is not man, but God

The full return of what we earn is veiled; ah, who can tell

What waits when we vacate this bumbling skin-and-bone-wrought shell?

The bell that tolls and collects souls is held, not by yon blue

But by the One, when life is done, that we will answer to

Lord, would that we will carry the awareness Your law

Not like a noose about the neck but with honor and awe

For we are called for more than killing time; this stint on sod

Is like a ladder that we climb to reckoning with God

© Janet Martin

How blessed are those whose way is blameless,

            Who walk in the law of the LORD.

Ps.119:1

 Open my eyes, that I may behold
            Wonderful things from Your law.
Ps.119:18

Faded Nothingness

"Merry Christmas! Happy December!" was Victoria's good-morning greeting today. 

I pass it on to you as November, like all its predecessors, fades to nothingness...

The last month of 2016.

Has ever a year been quite this quick?! 

We turn the page; as age on age fades into nothingness

Felled autumn’s apple-dappled stage waits for winter’s white dress

The jars that held sweet flower-stars has drained its filigree

As dreamers grapple with seasons, reason, reality

…and while we work and play and pray and hope for things to come

Another year of gold and gray collects its graven sum

This place we stand of shifting sand and gifted bric-a-brac

Transfixes us twixt looking forward, love, and looking back

The making of love’s tug-of-heartstrings takes us by surprise

Its ache of Nevermore competes with our daydreamer-sighs

Where wars life’s lords of hunger with the roar of fallen seed

Mouths and souls in constant demand of basal creature need

We turn the page; the wink and blink of years startles anew

Those age-old warnings once we argued we find out are true

Where love’s finesse of holding-letting-go is the caress

Of stories etched on pages made of faded nothingness

© Janet Martin

Not 'nothing' hopefully, in our hearts 

but still, nothing we can keep in our hands

Awesome Gallery

With all the work and worry of this hurry-hurry place

We sometimes miss the whisper-soft kisses of daily grace

The world is like a wonderland of grand and common gifts

Waiting to be unwrapped by eyes and fumbling fingertips

‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder’ cites the phrase

Then pray that we learn to behold with eyes-wide-open gaze

The colors of the world unfurl Masterpiece works of heart

To soothe strict toil and duty with the beauty of God’s art

The earth and the fullness thereof open its gates; no charge

To all, as we witness firsthand Originals At Large

Of leaf etched on a canvas that we cannot touch with hands

Of raindrop-dappled dances on four-season-fold grandstands

Love lavishes Time’s bittersweet with startling commonness

It scatters beneath hurried feet the miracle of ‘yes’

Where work and worry of this hurry-hurry place runs through

An awesome gallery of artwork, free to me and you

© Janet Martin

Wishing you a day of Awesome in unexpected places!

A Rare Undertaking

Today's Final Prompt: Write a last chance poem.

(This poem may be read as one or as six poem-lets)

Within the grin and growl of Time…of tumbles and slow-dances

We skin its scope of grief and hope and first and final chances

The air is rife with life’s delights and knife-like circumstances

The morning like a rose unfolds in blue and gold romances

Though we are old-er than we were and not so bold and daring

The firsts and lasts of love and life still overflow our bearing

Life’s firsts are often named, earmarked and widely celebrated

Its lasts intangible; heart-tugs, subtle and understated

What if today was the last day that we would share our laughter

What, through farewell’s tears would we say to cheer us ever after?

Each day is a first-final dance; what a rare undertaking

As feet move to the music of memories-in-the-making

© Janet Martin

(Thoughts and prayers with those in Tennessee and surrounding areas 

as they deal with wild-fire and other tornado aftermath.

One survivor worded it perfectly

'We can rebuild but we cannot replace'. )

Slow Dance With November Blue

For today’s prompt, we’re once again doing two-for-Tuesday prompt. So pick one, combine both prompts into one poem, or write two (or more) different poems. Here are the prompts:

• Write a love poem. A poem about love, people who are in love, attempting to woo, or some other lovely spin on the subject. Or…
• Write an anti-love poem. I know that for every lover there’s an equally powerful hater.

I love you; how you woo me with your blue November eyes

You stoke the hunger in my soul with leafless lullabies

There is no other lover quite as intimate as you

The wander-land of summer swept into November blue

I’ll miss you; for you kiss the countryside with mottled hues

Your painter’s tray is mostly gray and bronze and browns and blues

With here and there a sudden splash of hallelujah-green

To tease earth’s waning colors with echoes of seventeen

I love you; poet’s soulmate and maestro of early dusk

Your baton slips across the tips of stripped trees, blue and brusque

The song you play a melody of passion’s aftermath

A brittle leaf tap-dances on your frozen garden path

I love how gray becomes you on a rainy afternoon
No, you were never made for flowered frocks of May and June
But for lands after harvest and hands folded into prayer
For slow dancers that do not feel the need to rush somewhere

November blue, I’ll miss you; love's farewell is pleasure's pain

You weave such tender sweetness to your ‘til-we-meet-again’

The touch of you, slow, solemn; like somehow you’ll miss me too

Oh, troubadour of autumn, fare thee well and I love you

© Janet Martin