Of Fellow and Fallen Soldiers

 While we drove yesterday, little Miss Three-and-a-half named everything she saw

..."I see a house, a field, a tree etc...

then in a sudden change of tone I heard her say,

"I see a lot of soldiers. Bye soldiers. We miss you"

I looked; we were passing a graveyard.

Something in her 3yr.old mind equated graves with fallen soldiers!

Fitting, isn't it? Life gives all its 'soldiers' battles to fight, some public, some private.

...and on this note happy, happy first day of December! 😀

We smile, groan, gasp and grasp the hands

Of fellow-soldiers, for we know

Alone we fall, allied we stand

As sands of seasons ebb and flow

The tender love that drives us on

Wreaks havoc, oft where none can see

For ‘nothing new under the sun’

Is often new to you and me

This skin we wear is sure to show

If given time enough, war-scars

They come with hold and letting go

And tasting salty sorrow-stars

We charge beneath the glist’ring sun

And wade through tides of morn to night

Battalion dependent on

Life's Chief Captain for strength and light

…and on we forge through gorge and bog

Where past and future briefly merge

To shape the battlefields agog

With living’s temp’ramental splurge

Before that somber meeting place

When one among our numbers falls

And leaves this force of hope and grace

In response to the Captain’s call

An Ultimate we all will brave

Where dust-to dust is bittersweet

Memorialized around a grave

That marks the resting place for feet

…as The Great Mystery within

Embarks where feet have never trod

When mortal steps out of its skin

And returns to life's Giver;  God

© Janet Martin

In Memory of Gordon James Pringle 

The Armor of God 

Eph.6:10-18

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power.  

Put on the full armor of God, so that you can make your stand against the devil’s schemes.  

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, 

against the powers of this world’s darkness, 

and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

Therefore take up the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, 

you will be able to stand your ground, and having done everything, to stand. 

Stand firm then, with the belt of truth fastened around your waist, 

with the breastplate of righteousness arrayed,

and with your feet fitted with the readiness of the gospel of peace.

In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, 

with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.

And take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

Pray in the Spirit at all times, with every kind of prayer and petition. 

To this end, stay alert with all perseverance in your prayers for all the saints.

Farewell to November...

Wind whines through skeletal outlines of summer

Earth pines for luster of fresh-fallen coats

Nature, resplendent in garb of November

Composes eulogies lodged in our throats

Unsung harbinger of white winter-lands

Slipping frost fingers through bright-mittened hands

Whetting farewell’s threshold of *Auld Lang Syne

Tucking last leaves into eaves and fence-lines

This place of graves cradles more than braved hours

Earth is an echo-land, promise-entwined

Hope finds a foothold on hills primed with flowers

While eyes scan skylines of still-life resigned

Dash, freckled fellow and giggle, wee girlie

…where twilight tiptoes across porches early

November bids us remember somehow

How suave the bidding that doffs here and now

Soon the bare bough will bulge with budded fervor

Soon what seems beaten will restore its vim

Soon the stilled plow will return to the furrow

Soon trees will tremble with nature’s glad hymn

Round by the casements of cottage winds whimper
 While we stoke fires and prep hearts for winter

But like a vagabond, blue and unkissed

November disappears in rain and mist

© Janet Martin

*The phrase "for auld lang syne" essentially boils down to "for (the sake of) old times".

Back In The Day...

For today’s prompt, Last one, day 30!! can you believe it?!

write a “back in the day” poem. 

You might also call this a “good old days” poem or a “bad old days” poem.

This song rings with scenes from my 'back in the day':)

Through haze of days and willow-treed whisper

Silence plays childhood’s sentimental tune

Eighth notes kerplop, hands grab for the glister

Of apple-shaped gold on a hot afternoon

Summer-kissed darlings all arms, legs and whim

Dash where the hour entwines starry sighs

Drawing with nothing but bud to leaf limb

Dream-blind beginners from youth’s paradise

Mother calls ‘supper’ and we have each other

And don’t even know about loneliness

Five sons, five daughters, father and mother

A ‘Cheaper by the Dozen’ happiness

Want, like a match kindles eyes full of fire

Bellies burn but food cannot satisfy

Life, like a ladder lures each to climb higher

One by one, leaving extra pieces of pie

…and a wide wake of July mornings sparkling

Like glossy cherries on time’s farthest branch

Innocence strewn to the dust in a garden

Planted with echoes where once bare feet danced

© Janet Martin

From Far-flung Gates...

What an intro to time's never-before!!!

From amber ambience...

... to glowering blue-gray...

to bashful blush...

...to fiery fervor...

...to hello, sun!

...to gold unstoppered

...to brooding bank lowered...

...and puff! sunrise snuffed in gray

 The heavens declare the glory of God; 

the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

Psalm 19:1

From far-flung gates on mercy-shores

To earthy street and slope

The Father of love’s oceans pours

Man’s visage full of hope

He gilds time’s common curves where morn

Overflows gleaming trays

The pasture, sere and dead reborn

Fills man’s visage with praise

Mortal beholds and lifts his cup

From heaven-tinted dust

Toward the Fount that refills up

Man’s visage with meek trust

The sorrow-storms that seem must be

The heartaches we employ

Beneath eons of majesty

Fills man’s visage with joy

…where He who breathes on welkin dark

Moves night with blush and gold

As awestruck passengers embark

Anew on ways of old

…from far-flung gates of mercy-stores

To front row seats of sod

The Keeper of hope’s fathoms pours

Man’s visage full of God

© Janet Martin

Plight of the Poet

 ...above page from the book below

Gaps gape; thought grasps at unshaped word like cats at butterflies

Messages at the mercy of the mind vex virile sighs

Caught like the land when night is spent before dawn’s splurge of light

The hand is poised but reticent to unclothe Soul to sight

A lone-wolf pioneer that plows plots pressed on middle-air

And who knows what thunders across the stage of soundless stare

The page, a patient friend suffers the brunt of bribes uncouth

And waits out wars that wage while whispers sculpt out ageless truth

A tempest through which thought must feel for a stable foothold

To draw from wells of ink that served earnest poets of old

Where Poet of Time’s Present Day strives to pay homage to

The hands that did not heave the pen away when they were blue

Distraction flirts and puts on skirts to lure ungoverned gaze   

Diligence takes Her by the chin to rein in hunger's blaze

The tumult that precedes tender surrender, not defeat

Makes stronger the defendant and the victory more sweet

Press on, poet, thy charge thou canst not freely disregard

Though unbeknownst to masses is the voyage of the bard

Through looming halls and forests walled with noises veiled in dark

Until the quill finds the inferno that ignites the spark

© Janet Martin