Who Knows...But This

What waits to be in poetry?

Will it be triumph of success?

Or disappointment's infantry

Marching through tampered happiness

What waits to be for you and me?

Ah, will it author joy or dread

As twilight lowers to the sea

A canopy of bronze and red

What waits to bloom where bud as yet

Has not unveiled the thread within

The Future, a dark silhouette

That Today's colors will fill in

What waits to be a memory?

Where consequence and circumstance

Insist upon the courtesy

Of how and why we choose to dance

Who knows the woe that waits to be
The joy still set out of our reach
Where Love, in perfect sympathy
Lends lessons only tears can teach

What waits to be revealed where we

Walk through a way as yet untrod?

Who knows but this; that we will be

Held and beheld by faithful God

© Janet Martin

 Looking unto Jesus
the author and finisher of our faith;
who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross,
despising the shame,
and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Heb.12:12

 He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us,  as you help us by your prayers. Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many.
2 Cor.1:10-11

This poem was inspired in part,
as I prayed for my sister-in-law Karen who is still not able to walk since her fall a few weeks ago.
Hopefully a cat-scan this Friday will give some answers!
Please continue to keep her and Dave in your prayers! 

Rites of Passage...

What a month celebrating the 'rites of passage' this June has been!

Babies, birthdays, baptisms, weddings, anniversaries...and funerals!

This is life.

Hope and heartache meld mere moments

Joy and sorrow interlock

Love and longing try their torment

Through the ticking of the clock

Winter, summer wields its whisper

Mystery and aftermath

Carves within thought’s world of wonder

Faith and fear’s opposing path

Sunrise, sunset-seasoned suture

Skims the sod and keens the Soul

To the winnowing of  Future

Drawing us toward The Goal

Give and taking in the making

Of what we will suffer next

Leaving we of sleep and waking

Sweetly glad and sorely vexed

© Janet Martin

At Sweet, Sweet Last...Summer!

I began writing this poem on the first day of summer (first verse)

then suddenly time frisked five-days from my fingers...😒😊!

...in very wow-some ways!

Now dawns the fond season of long daylight hour

Of ponds filled with children and fields frilled with flow’r

Of earth all a-bloom with beauty as bud breaks

Of wheat fields a-shimmer, like bisque-colored lakes

Of lily-shaped chalice and laughter of leaves

The world like a palace of pastures and trees

And lilting of lark-song and droning of bee

And bare-footed canter of scholar, carefree

…and banter of breeze in the green before sheaves

And strawberries teasing taste-buds with ‘more please’

Of sun on a grand, golden platter at morn

Melting over gardens like butter on corn

Of hearts all agog with day-dreaming, oh my

Of strolling on beaches ‘til we touch the sky

Of soft-rolling surf smoothing out on the sand

And soothing the listener with its ageless band

Of sudden surprises too num’rous to name

Of wonder-filled Masterpieces none can frame

As simple arrangements of sky, sea and sod

Startles Longing’s smart with free art-work from God

Of rush of pure joy as plumes put on Best Frocks

Of rekindled friendships with pink hollyhocks

Of lying beneath high noon’s on-and-on sweep

Where clouds dot blue eons like woolly, white sheep

Of love’s keen awareness of what comes to pass

Of slowing our footsteps on sun-dappled grass

…and learning to linger in spite of the law

That authors both labor and slumber’s hurrah

Of rose-ravished rapture and sweat-lavished brow

Of caught between tug-of-heart wishes and Now

Of lolling at dusk while the dust of the day

Settles like gold mist where twilight’s minstrels play

Now dawns the fond flicker of June and July

Savor sun-sweet moments but don’t close your eyes  

Too long lest the bliss of its kiss turns to snow

And hold insists on its flipside, letting go

© Janet Martin

The Gift of Life

Life is a gift, was a phrase often repeated in Saturday's message at a funeral I attended.

To God, our worship’s wonder and profound humility

For He saw fit to grant the gift of life to you and me

Then in return the least and best that we may strive to bring

Is to make each new day a gift befitted for a King

To God, the Author of Hope’s Steadfast anchor for the soul

Where mankind’s gift of life is not fate’s free-fall or sink hole

But He who gives and takes offers to all who will believe

A gift of life that does not end with the last breath we breathe

To God, who tucks man’s gift of life within Time’s envelope

Where soon the husk-of live-laugh-love is winnowed from its Hope

Then, all that remains when that which sustains our breath is spent

Is a most sacred face-to-face reckoning appointment

To God who cannot follow; Time’s Supreme Authority

Bids all who hold the gift of life to ‘come and follow Me’

Lest we forfeit His gift of Everlasting life for lesser boast

And in some vain attempt to find we lose what matters most

To God who does not answer to anyone; He is God

The Author and the Finisher of all that we applaud

Where He, though Lord of all, suffered deep loss for sinner’s gain

And grants after this gift of Life His gift of life again

© Janet Martin

Men swear by someone greater than themselves, and their oath serves as a confirmation to end all argument. So when God wanted to make the unchanging nature of His purpose very clear to the heirs of the promise, He guaranteed it with an oath. Thus by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be strongly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and steadfast. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where Jesus our forerunner has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.

 Heb.6:16-20

A Serious Poem About A Serious Certainty

At the beginning of this week one of my best friends bid good-bye to her dad, Amsey Bowman

Today we mourn the loss of my Uncle Myron Martin 

So much opportunity once again to contemplate the Inevitable Must of dust-to-dust!

"...before the dust returns to the ground from which it came,

and the spirit returns to God who gave it."

Eccles.12:7

Death is The Great Divider

Stealing loved ones from our touch

But God is a Greater Provider

And He loves us oh, so much

Death is a grim reminder

Of what waits for one and all

But God’s love is always kinder

Than Death, when it comes to call

Death keeps us humbly thankful

For life’s most commonplace day

God’s grace and mercy are faithful

No matter what comes our way…

Death keeps us gladder for gardens

For blue skies sprawled overhead

Daisy and clover-strewn meadows

Sunrise and sunset, bronze-red

Death makes us think about others

Before its kiss chills our brow

Let’s all be sisters and brothers

Love one another here-now

Death makes us hurt for the hurting

Who will be next; who can tell

Death makes us think about Heaven

Death makes us think about Hell

Death is a breath-stealing river

Death is That Last Stepping-stone

When Life is returned to its Giver

Where God is still on His throne

© Janet Martin

Eccles.12:1-7

 Remember your Creator in the days of your youth,

before the days of adversity come,

and the years approach of which you will say,

“I find no pleasure in them,”

2before the sunlight, moon, and stars are darkened,

and the clouds return after the rain,

3on the day the keepers of the house tremble,

and the strong men stoop,

when those grinding cease because they are few,

and those watching through windows see dimly,

4when the doors to the street are shut

and the sound of the mill fades away,

when one rises at the sound of a bird,

and all the daughters of song grow faint,

5when men fear the heights and dangers of the road,

when the almond tree blossoms,

the grasshopper loses its spring,

and the caper berry shrivels—

for then man goes to his eternal home,

and mourners walk the streets.

6Remember Him before the silver cord is snapped,

and the golden bowl is crushed,

before the pitcher is shattered at the spring,

and the wheel is broken at the well,

7before the dust returns to the ground from which it came,

and the spirit returns to God who gave it.