Thursday Thoughts on Choice and Circumstance...

We cannot always choose the hues

Of living’s tapestry

But it is up to us to use

Each color carefully

The high and low of joy and woe

We often must admit

Is not so much the status quo

As what we make of it

Each gifted day soon fades away

The gold and gray thereof

When woven through our do and say

Proves who and what we love

***

We ought not to fret when what we get

Is not what choice decreed

God will provide, not for our pride

But for our humble need

***

The more we get of what we want

The more we soon forget

The One we ought to depend on

No matter what life’s Let

***

Most oft the thing we would not choose

Becomes the medium that proves

In our response to circumstance

If we believe in God or chance

***

Our choice to circumstance will shape

The scenes in memory’s landscape

Then help us Lord, in every quest

To remember where choice will rest

***

Time is of the essence

An essence none can see

Save in the constant presence

Where choice shapes history

 ***

When temptation would turn our eyes

From wisdom and discretion’s prize

Lord, as we contemplate its choice

Help us to heed Your still, small Voice

Lest, alas, we look back too late

As consequence swings wide its gate

***

Be careful what you do

Be careful what you say

To see this conquest through

Be prayerful every day

***

Joy, a kin to sorrow

Sorrow, kin to joy

One without the other cannot be, 

Dear girl and boy 

***

We can choose to love

But to be loved

We cannot force

Love unreturned

Is possible

Only through love’s Source

 ***

Not matter what this day may bring

Or where upon its way we trod

Our choices are the offering

That at day’s end, we bring to God

© Janet Martin

On Doing Our Part...

He does his part

He frills the trees with leaves

Earth’s eaves with blue

He stirs the hold

That bursts in gold

And emerald avenue

He spills to rills

And wind-swept hills

A merry melody

The very air we breathe

Is charged with

 Art and poetry

The girth of earth

Is like a canvas

Every crest and crease

A high and low

Of dark and light

In mercy’s masterpiece

The bird, the bloom’s

Prolific boon

And tune is like a prayer

To He who does His part

To startle

The onlooker's stare

…Then do your part

And let the love of looking

Steal your heart

As you inhale

The miracle

In nature’s perfect art

© Janet Martin

 Proverbs 3:19
The LORD by wisdom founded the earth, By understanding He established the heavens.

Heralding May

There's an air of festivity in these parts today; the first truly warm day of the season!

Gold laughter spills across yon hills and down each lusty lane

The whisper of earth's newborn loveliness sighs beneath blue

In maple-trees green melodies of summer surge again

As memories-in-waiting wait to become dreams come true

Morn-silence like a megaphone rings with spring's promised prize

The poetry of pink and purple petals awes the bard

Where, with pen poised to snare the voice of Poem in disguise

She cannot, with mere jot capture wonder, once winter-scarred

The broken bowl of Bygone brims with blossom-hymns and such

And everyone is welcome to blue-welkin balladry

To sup on new day's grand buffet and revel 'neath the touch

Of jonquil-tinted Brigadoon and jasmine-minted tea

Grace grins, a breath-soft butterfly-like flutter of first leaf

Where Mother Nature's sheaf is refurbished with girls and boys

Bedecked in flowered dresses and tresses of feathered wreath

And numberless nuances heralding creation's joys

Janet Martin

 

Finding True Beauty

 Rain rules and cuts short outdoor chores well-planned.

(Praying and planting seem to go hand in Hand)

We entrust seed's bounty to the Giver and

ask strength and wisdom for toil's 'meanwhile-demand'

No matter what we hold,

Every good and perfect gift is from above, 

coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, 

who does not change like shifting shadows.

James 1:17

Hold lightly what God grants thee

Like trees and birds and flow’rs

Everything is His bounty

And never really ours

Each life, a gift from heaven

Its strife, the price of sin

Its hope, Lord of creation

Its light, the love of Him

Hold lightly what God grants thee

And trust His full control

Then peace will be the beauty

That satisfies thy soul

© Janet Martin

The Way Life Works

Well, said Luke after bravely drying his tears (after a soaker induced by a big bump from little sister while he proudly filled the bird-bath) ‘this is the way life works…sometimes when you pour water you get wet!”

Well, this is the way life works, love

Water makes us wet

And whatever seed we plant, love

Is the plant we get

If we eat too much too much, love

There's ‘too much’ of us

If we overlook God’s love, love

We will fret and fuss

If we want to be ‘nice old folk’

We must be nice young

If we want to keep the peace, love

We must bite our tongue

If we leap before we look, love

We deserve disgrace

If we want to win the prize, love

We must run the race

Yes, this is the way life works, love

We reap what we sow

And the more we learn, we learn, love

How little we know

But one thing is sure and certain

God’s grace grants each day

Aren't you glad, so sweetly glad, love 

That life works this way?

© Janet Martin

In Praise of Green

 Green and gold seem in sort of a duel for dominance these days but this poem is in praise of green

Green spreads its grace across a place that long was void of vim

The slumbering bud and seed wakens whispers to sod and limb

Where hallelujah songs of nature nurtures thankful gaze

As color-wheels of mercy thrill the humble heart with praise

God kisses earth with favor; where green sweeps were held at bay

He breaks the dam that wakes the land that long was brown and gray

Across the countryside a tide impeccable in shade

Most glorious, victorious, gilds mortal's promenade

Hope’s divine intervention renders living proof, green-spun

He never forgets to send spring when winter’s fling is done

Now blue sky is a timbrel and the golden sun a gong

And man a humble minstrel chiming amen to each song

Janet Martin