Ignorance is Bliss But It Won't Fix The Problem...

This morning as I blithely wrote about being gladder than we sometimes are 

 I was oblivious to the lake in the basement…

Last night I painted a poem about Midnight Rain(ha-ha, I even mentioned flood-gates😏)

 as it pelted the window and I couldn’t sleep
and I didn’t know then that the sump pump hose was clogged with ice
and Rain Poetry would lose its Romanticism in an instant,

 simply by going down to the freezer to take out a pound of ground beef for supper.

I went out for coffee/shopping with a friend
thinking the flood had been retained in the ‘old’ part of our basement,
not the rec room. I was wrong!

 (I've been researching how to paint cement-floors.
That idea is starting to sound very appealing😐)

I'm tired of 'let's lift the rug' game!

Because we cannot see into tomorrow we are free

To not borrow the 'sorrow' that is waiting yet to be

To not double our trouble by ‘what if’s’ futile distress

But take the day in hand and try to find its happiness

Tomorrow Today’s good or ill will compose yesterday

And who knows what is waiting to spill from time’s refilled tray

So by the grace of God we go, and if we let Him lead

He will provide at the right time, exactly what we need

 (in this case, mops, fans, a roaring mother, oops, I mean, fire;-)

© Janet Martin

So much for a cozy, Christmas-y room...

Oh well, then I remember those with real troubles.

A Hymn For Him Inspired by Farewell-fired 'Things'

The line in this poem; *And coffee with a slice of cheese
Was inspired by my being deliciously spoiled this Christmas
with two of my most favorite things in the world... Coffee and cheese!

This poem is a little collection of this spent year's mementos ...

For jars filled with forget-me-nots

For flower pots on windowsills

For innocence of tiny tots

For wonder’s unexpected thrills

For circle-notes on puddled lane

For leaf-boats on its little lakes

For laughter’s silver-sparkle strains

For supper soup and birthday cakes

For scenes that twinkle through our touch

But rest forever in the heart

For everyone we love so much

Whether together or apart

For hope for things to come, where Past

Has such a hearty appetite

Yet each day hoists a virgin mast

And bids us sail toward the night

Not swaddled yet in death’s cold bod

Not blindfolded or bound in chains

But free to see, hear and applaud

Each Masterpiece that God sustains

For the fond bond of true friendship  

For home-sweet-home and family

For August afternoons that drip

Like honey to a cup of tea

For wealth of health and strength for toil

For hard work’s well-earned beauty-sleep

For summer’s unmerited spoil

Where nature gifts what none can keep

For fuzzy socks and apple pie

*And coffee with a slice of cheese

For four-season wind-lullaby

And thousand unnamed luxuries

For what we understand, or not

Where we are all students of life

For Mercy’s unwavering lot

Reaffirmed where new day runs rife

For what we name and what we miss

Dear Lord, accept our hymn of praise

And keep us ever keened to this;

The Never-ending End of Days

For mantles made of morning mist

For candles made of autumn’s leaf

For the refurbished to-do list

For wrinkles proving Time is chief

For laughter of both heart and brook

For After Dark’s strange Art unfurled

For the barge of a story-book

And armchair, to travel the world

For Goodness none of us have earned

For lessons gleaned from what has been

For woods when springtime has returned

With sundry-splendored shades of green

For promises still being met

For awesomeness of simple things

Like buttered bread, common and yet

It makes us feel like queens and kings

For holding before letting go

For babies bouncing on our knee

For ‘always something we don’t know’

The beauty of Discovery

For Old Year tumbling from Time’s sill

For New Year’s intangible Yet

Like a big jar that we will fill

With flowers we still have not met

© Janet Martin

Gladder Than we Were...

 Today marks a year for a family near here 

who is gathering together to remember a son and brother,

Gone suddenly, so soon.

Thoughts and prayers continue to be with them, their lives forever altered!

Let's live as if this might be the last day we have to love/have each other!

Lord, make us glad for what we have

Each other; kindly blessed

Before the journey from a grave

Where dust and ashes rest

Before the head bows, sorrow-bent

The heart broken and sad

Before we wish that we had spent

More time just being glad

Before the door twixt here and There

Seals someone from our touch

Lord, make us gladder than we were

For those still here with us

And let our gladness prove its part

By what we do and say

Before we wish with all our heart

For simply ‘one more day’

© Janet Martin

Without Argument or Complaint

 Last night I started to pray this prayer but simply could not remember all the lines 

so I decided it's time to give this, one of my Charlie Pride favs, a listen or three!

It rises ere dark fades away

Yet often labours late

It never takes a holiday

Or bars its front yard gate

It does not seek out praise or fame

But shoulders common care

Without argument or complaint

Or claiming its ‘fair share’

Its cloth of meek and modest mien

It turns the other cheek

And often thinks, then thinks again

When it has words to speak

Its charge leaves little room to pout

About its grant of grace

That none of us can live without

And nothing takes its place

Patient and kind, worth more than gold

It never seeks its own

And rich or poor or young or old

It cannot thrive alone

It doesn’t look like much sometimes

A soiled and tattered glove

Its road, detours and steep inclines

But still we call it love

© Janet Martin

Midnight Rain...

The staccato of rain tip-taps the raven window-pane

The lane is lost in lacquer-glossed expanse of ebony

And earth is like a bit of bling hung on a silver chain

Its girth a big black hole as far as anyone can see

Where what we know exists by day has disappeared, it seems

So close your eyes, the paradise of sweet dreams gently waits

The outside world swish-washed away in midnight’s rushing streams

Until the morning flings ajar its yet far-off flood-gates

© Janet Martin