Dialogue at Daybreak

Darling, earth is kissed with morning; tell me, where shall we begin?

With the wars where love and worship test domains beneath the skin

Darling, calm amidst storm’s chaos is a hard thing to achieve

Yes, but only if we fail to fully trust Whom we believe

Darling, life would be a pity without love to conquer all

Yes, my dear, let’s stand together for alone we surely fall

  

Tell me darling, was it worth it, when the winter closes in?

Were the miles that lie behind us worth these atrophies of skin?

For, oh my love, there is no turning back to start again

But the earth is kissed with morning; tell me, where shall we begin?

Who knows when somewhere we passed the halfway mark from Here to there

Yes my dear, let’s live each day as if we have no time to spare

Darling, there is much at stake here in this wake and sleep facade

Yes, we should make the most of it before touch turns cold as sod

Before God, who knows the number of our days when we are born

Snuffs the flame that lights the gamut of time’s tolling morn to morn

Darling, oh my darling, tell me when we meet that place we part

Will you always keep a candle burning for me in your heart?

© Janet Martin

 The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, for our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is nearly over; the day has drawn near. So let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. 

Rom.13:11-12

Lessons Learned and Re-learned

For today’s prompt, day 20, write a “what I learned” poem.

The Past no one can reach,

But oh, it reaches far

 To teach us just how long the arms

Of short-lived actions are

***

The future never looks

Like we pictured, when past

It's landscape is the shape of choices

Oft made far too fast

***

Sometimes life-circumstance

Forces fresh point of views

And though circumstance
 Seems out of our hands

Response, we always choose

***

When I think less of 'me'

And more of 'we' and 'us'

I find I have the eyes to see

Beyond my fretting fuss

***

The longer that I live

The shorter seasons seem

So I have learned to treat each day

With reverent esteem

***

The longer that I live

The less it seems I know

The less I know the more I need

God's grace, whereby I go 

***

The School-master of life is wise

And kind to we, sight-blind

If we forget much that we learn

We should keep this in mind

Though His lessons to mortal dust

May not always seem such

It is so we may learn to trust

He who loves us so much

***

To be wise in one's selfish eyes

Blinds us to evil's way

To fear God is to shun the lies

That else would lead astray 

***

Not on platforms of victory

But crawling in the dirt

Is where I learn true sympathy

For a brother's hurt

***

When crowds have fled and death lies red

Upon earth's grave-ward lea

Still there is One, when life is done

That will abide with me

***

Ah, dread would fill my head with fear

And fear would be a noose

Without God's promises, my dear

To cut this captive loose

***

How pray tell, can we find comfort

And peace on this earth, war-torn

From the Word that never alters

Since the day the world was born

***

Now a few practical discoveries

I have learned that writing poems

Does not get the laundry hung

Does not dust, sweep, scrub the kitchen

But oh, it keeps the spirit young

***

I have learned there is no fountain

Filled with youth's euphoric flit

But the potion in a poem

Is the next best thing to it 

***

He who looks with humble honor

No matter what he may see

Finds pure beauty in the common

Through the eyes of poetry

***

Not the cold gold of a dollar

Not the pomp-and-show grandstand

Success lies in every scholar

That makes love their Chief Command

Janet Martin

 above pages from book pictured below

Abundant Mercy

For today’s prompt,Day 19, write an abundant poem. 

There are so many instances of abundance in the world: 

Abundant sunshine; abundant happiness; abundant evil; and in November, abundant poetry!

We who wear both want and wonder

Walk where Love never forsakes

From His Heaven mercy thunders

Through time’s blunder-chiseled wakes

We who trip and slip and stumble

Are not left to our own means

Mercy, mentor to the humble

Pours in hope-restoring streams

We who make a mess of blessing

When regret opens our eyes

Find abundant mercy waiting

To forgive repentant cries

We who need so much assurance

In this trouble-rubble race

Lean on mercy’s kind endurance

From a faithful Father’s grace

We who weep and mourn find courage

Mercy meets us where we are

Frees the heart and mind from bondage

On the black night pins a star

 

© Janet Martin

 It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.

They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.

Lam.3:22-23

But because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ, even when we were dead in our trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved!…

Eph.2:4-5

I Meant To Say 'I Love You'

 PAD prompt 17: For today’s prompt, write a “what I meant to say” poem. As someone who takes his time to consider what to say, I often find myself in this position of knowing what I meant to say…after the moment has passed. If you’ve ever been in that position, here’s your chance to write out what you meant to say.

 um, I haven't told Matt yet...
I forgot to bring in his hockey equipment last night:(

 

( post script; when Victoria saw this photo she shrieked so I showed her what I wrote about it below then she laughed, choosing to 'embrace' as well, instead of clean...for now:)

Dear son, I meant to say I love you

by airing out your hockey equipment for you,

but then I left it in the rain...

 Dear daughter, instead of saying 'I love you so much'

I asked you to clean up your room

...again

Hubby, why does my 'I love you' come out

too easily misunderstood

because somehow it didn't sound quite like

I know it could or should

...and God, why is it easier to spout love

in poesy-sweet rhymes

Oh, oh, no small wonder I blush

when I think of all the times

I shut the door

 or shut The Book

or shut my eyes

and ears

to Your love

ever faithful

through my tantrums, fears and tears

..so today I pray for ways to tell again

to those whose lives I touch

"I love you" (with no 'buts' attached)

So very, very

Much

Janet Martin

.. so He nudged me to walk over to Victoria and give her a big hug, right where she was,
and tell her "I love you very much" so I did, much to her puzzlement
so, I told her what I was writing
and how I don't tell her in plain 'I love you' language nearly enough, that I do!
AND...I didn't tell her to clean up her room but chose to embrace Her expressions of
loving the life she lives;-)

 

Good-for-nothing Love

PAD Challenge day 18: For today’s prompt, write a good for nothing poem.

Initially, I couldn't think of a topic when I saw today's prompt...

...but when I told my son (after he came home from a LONG overdue haircut)
 that I can look at him with motherly pride once again
he said, 'oh, so you only love me if I have short hair' to which I said,
"my love for you is the same no matter what your hair looks like;
my motherly pride, however, isn't" :)
(I simply like his hair shorter rather than a floppy mop, but that's just an exterior preference
which, I reminded him, is why I never told him to get a hair-cut because I wanted him to want it:)
...it got me to thinking,
Imagine if 'love' meant meeting full approval or
if it was gauged by circumstance!
What a good-for-nothing love that would be!

my  love for you
 has nothing to do
with meeting my approval
or with circumstance
if it were so
love would be a pitiful show
of word gymnastics
and clapping hands

(which is why I often sign my little messages to my children,
love always,
Mom )

Janet Martin

Today The Artist Chooses Gray...

Yesterday grinned like a giddy November flower

 Today drips from heaven's eaves and strips gaze of its bower

It lolls, a listless lake in leafless limbs stripped of cajole

It drapes a shapeless cape across croft, coppice, creek and knoll

It hangs a hood on brooding woods and veils the face of day

A weightless, widespread weight agape in gray on gray on gray

It muffles manmade mayhem in a diadem of fog

The car we hear but cannot see, the neighbor’s barking dog

A velvet vroom gone viral, it obliterates the view

And makes the small man reckon he is smaller than he knew

The Artist of this Masterpiece mutes colors giddy-gay

He murmurs ‘it is good’ and moves his brush through welkin tray 

He, Whisperer of spheres metes more than meets man’s naked eyes

Today He chooses gray; plush hush shrouds Expectation’s prize

© Janet Martin

Hold To The Hand...a repost

For I am the LORD your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, 

Do not fear; I will help you. 

Isa.41:13

Hold to the hand that holds the sand that trickles through time’s glass

The Keeper of His promises knows what will come to pass

Then should the fight be hard and night reach far into the day

Still, hold the hand that holds us in each untold come-what-may

Hold to the hand that holds the land and sea in folds of blue

He parts the waters of the deep so that we may pass through

And should the way that he allows seem foreign to our want

Still, hold the hand that holds us close where fear and worry taunt

Hold to the hand that will not fail though oft it seems, we must

Yet, if we never failed then would we ever truly trust?

His hands are rich with mercy, granting courage for this strife

Hold to the hand that holds us in the gray and gold of life

Hold to the hand that holds the plans for every one of us

And wore the nails and bore the cross for our sin; Jesus

Hold to His hand, He understands what we can never know

Hold to the hand that holds us near and never lets us go

© Janet Martin

rerun time:) 

6 kiddos coming today, two in a few minutes so no writing time for now:)

Hope we all have a  hold-to-His-Hand kind of day!

God Bless.