Minute-Metaphysics

Sometimes we feel the reel of it

In nothing but the ‘steal’ of it

Across the hill at dusk a bit

Or in the still of dawn

But often in the dream of it

We lose sight of its scheme a bit

While balancing the stream of it

With bridges we walk on

Sometimes we sense the slip of it

And try to drink the drip of it

While grappling with the grip of it

This Thing that disappears

But often in the thick of it

We overlook the quick of it

And how the steady tick of it

Turns moments into years

Sometimes we clutch the Much of it

And struggle with the Such of it

While learning ‘neath the touch of it

About both joy and strife

But often in the heat of it

We undermine the beat of it

And how the bittersweet of it

Turns years into a life

© Janet Martin

Meaning of Life

What, the meaning of this sorrow

Where tomorrow wears a veil

And the fantasies we borrow

Are distorted with travail

What, the meaning of the hour

That can drain youth’s lithesome stride

With naught but morn’s newborn flower

And its grave on eventide

What, the meaning of this hunger

That no treat can satisfy

While our looking back grows longer

As time dwindles its supply

What, the meaning of this flicker

Soon it fades in Farewell’s seal

In a sepulcher of echoes

That nobody can repeal

What the meaning, oh my darling

Of each kiss, each tear, each sigh

That, in the grand-scape of living

Always leads us to good-bye

What, the meaning of these seasons

Veneer on earth’s earthy scrim

Ah, the Giver grants the reason

It is our means back to Him

© Janet Martin

If we think life is not worth its strife and plod

We under-estimate Heaven, my love

And oh, we under-estimate God

Because Time Is Serious Business... Because Its Accounting Is Absolute

Time’s investment doled in moments

Leaves us breathless now and then

Holy, holy, like an ocean

Rolling from God down to men

Where we spend its ‘lend’ of hours

Purchasing, oft without voice

Consequence of transient bowers

And the aftermath of choice

People all begin as students

Rife with ignorance and lust

Learning the import of prudence

Through the hunger-pangs of trust

After we have borne the beauty

That turns raven locks to white

We see time as more than duty

To a corpse of morn-noon-night

We see Time as serious business

Like sun-sparkles on a sea

Where investments leave us breathless

…its payoff, eternity

© Janet Martin

When That Sure Then Is Now

Someday beneath time’s wide-eyed sigh

And wind-swept passes we will lie

A stone-carved epitaph perhaps

To mark our resting-place of ash

Tell me, when that sure Then is now

(with dash of feet above our brow

Still unsnared by eternity

Where Death bares immortality)

Tell me, when This returns to dust

And we witness firsthand its trust

Forever, for eternity

Do you know where your soul will be?

© Janet Martin

 Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord;
    let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation.
Psalm 95:1

Because We Pass This Way ...But Once

Because We Pass This Way… But Once

I shall pass this way but once; any good that I can do or any kindness I can show to any human being; let me do it now. Let me not defer nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

Etienne de Grellet

Quaker Missionary

Because we pass this way but once

And know only that which we learn

And learn only that which we earn

Through ephemeral experience

…because we never finish learning

We learn to appreciate

With kinder eyes and slower gait

This one-way path of no-returning

Because we are equipped with need

We need each other to lean on

Where each day, like a stepping-stone

Suffers the spawn of word and deed

Because we cannot retrace days

With more than wish or gratitude

We should practice an attitude

Of awe for mercy’s faithful ways

© Janet Martin

Running a little low on awe?!

Get acquainted with a child...

Speaking of leaning on each other...or being 'knit together'...a beautiful post here!