Wednesday, December 28, 2016

Life!



 Take time to turn moments into treasures

This day-to-day we live might make us feel like dots on earth
The smallness of moments somehow seeming of little worth
But, in the face of death, we meet the breadth of sacred sums
Then we begin to recognize what day-to-day becomes

…how who we are is more than given name, but what we say
And how we choose to use living’s deluge of day-to-day
For when these moments tally up it takes us by surprise
To realize, as we look back how quick they make a life

Then seize this day-to-day and live to please its Giver, oh,
For when time drains its final drop, not one of us can know
But here we are and what we do with it will come to be
When day-to-day is brushed away, a life-cast memory

Oh, pray each day-to-day we leave in living’s wake is kind
Time's measure turned to treasure for loved ones still left behind
And pray we do not squander without second thought or glance
The one thing we can celebrate while we still have the chance
...Life

© Janet Martin

Three years ago at Christmas our friends bid farewell to their dear mother.
This year their dad joined her to spend their first Christmas together in Heaven...
He is fondly remembered by many family and friends.
At his visitation this afternoon their were many mementos on display, of a life well loved and lived!
What will they remember of you and I after we are gone?

 Rest in peace, Lloyd and Minerva

Youth Is As Youth Does...



1920's
Though generations come and go...
youth remains the same

1950's
2016...



Sometimes I wish
That I could spare
You from wrong choice
And its heartaches
But youth must be
As youth will be
You’ll learn the truth
Through your mistakes

Some things, as hard
As I may try
I cannot make you
Understand
Until, after
Matters of act
You learn the bitter truth
Firsthand

© Janet Martin

Photo #1-Grandpa or his pal
Photo # 2-Uncle Willie
Photo # 3-neighbors
Photo # 4-Matt, our son

Forecast For 2017



 There Will Be Birthdays...
Easter...
Christmas...
 New Year...
 ...and so much more!
Laughter...
Thanksgiving...
War...
Love...
These cards were once-upon-a-long-ago sent to my grandparents...



There will be death
And birth
The earth
Will bear the brunt
Of haste and greed
But by divine
Authority
The bark will bloom
With broken seed

There will be tears
And fears
The year
Will burgeon with
Uncertainty
There will be hate
And love and war
And faithful God’s
Fidelity


There will be rain
And pain
And grain
Fields rippling
Gold ‘neath golden sun
There will be loss
And Sunday dinners
And mothers praying
When day is done

There will be June
High noon
Blue moon
And soon petals
Where snowflakes fall
There will be bloodshed
Horror, hope
And heaven for some
But not all

There will be care
Despair
And prayer
To He who
Never changes, no,
Though churches stand
Bereft landmarks
Of faith forsaken
Long ago

Yes, there will be death
Birthdays,
Weddings,
Both firsts and lasts
Will turn to dust
There will be doubt
But never without
God, wherein
Mankind may trust

© Janet Martin




Tuesday, December 27, 2016

To Time's Touch



In August you lie on my skin, sun-warm and flower-kind
In December you vex my grin with summers left behind


Still, ice-kisses pressed on my cheek remind me not to weep
But fumble with what dusk dismisses to past’s darksome deep

...because what was cannot return; and what waits, who can say?
Futile to ransack today's urn in search of yesterday


Thus, though we pine for zephyrs strumming vine laden with leaf
We drink the pink of snow-sunrises veiling slumb’ring sheaf


The hour, like a flower, unfolds, blooms, its shadow dims
And fades to nothing but the tune in bygone's hallowed hymns


Time's moment-gold we hold soon drifts in ashes cold and gray
December's embers snuffed like stars at dawn or summer's day

© Janet Martin




Of More To Come





Quixotic feet
Platonic mete
Bitter and sweet
Fleet pageantry
Macabre mime
Weaving with Time’s
Rhythm and rhyme,
A memory

Thorn-procured rose
Morn-secured pose
Dusk-obscured close
Yes-and-no’s clash
Windows and doors
Heavens and floors
Thugs, troubadours
My, what a splash

Perhaps, never
Secure, sever
Gone forever
…slippery sum
Of wonder-wars
Where yonder bars
Soft-spill star-jars
Of more to come

© Janet Martin