Once More Daybreak...

Daybreak; what a gift!

Let your light so shine before men, 

that they may see your good works,

 and glorify your Father which is in heaven. 

Matt.5:16

Once more daybreak’s blush-gold glory draws our eyes to prize hope’s feast

Mercy’s Magnum Opus unfolds like a flower on the east

Beckoning the humble pilgrim pressing toward Heaven’s goal

To reckon redemption’s risen, reigning Savior of the soul

To give thanks and awestruck honor, proving praise as we obey

He who sets His law and order in the bedrock of Today

As dawn’s light flows through the darkness and yon boundless fathoms brim

Pray, the Light of loving kindness will draw all glory to Him

Pray for rekindled awareness of faith’s living sacrifice

Pray for a conscious preparedness for worship’s ultimate price

Pray however meek and lowly our service seems to be

That we offer it with holy, sincere generosity

Once more daybreak hoists the emblem of God’s merciful regard

Sets upon the earth and heavens a semblance of love’s postcard

As compassion stays the legions that wait all around His Throne

As He looks upon the millions He is waiting to atone

Once more daybreak peals with promise; God is gracious to forgive

Death, oh, death is not victorious if we look on Him and live

Come, oh sinner, poor and needy, will you still refuse to pray

Daring to meet God unready in Death’s ‘no more break of day’

© Janet Martin

Come, Ye Sinner, Poor and Needy

Once Upon Many a Wistful Morrow (have been here and gone)

Happy September!!!

And to Adam He said:

“Because you have listened to the voice of your wife

and have eaten from the tree

of which I commanded you not to eat,

cursed is the ground because of you;

through toil you will eat of it

all the days of your life.

18Both thorns and thistles it will yield for you,

and you will eat the plants of the field.

19By the sweat of your brow

you will eat your bread,

until you return to the ground—

because out of it were you taken.

For dust you are,

and to dust you shall return.”

Gen.3:17-19 (BSB)

We have toiled 'by the sweat of our brow', haven't we?!!

And Lord willing we are not done yet!

And we have eaten, haven't we?!

Thank-you, gracious Heavenly Father!

While not everything may have bloomed, obedient to expectation's hope, 

as we planted seeds, seedlings, and bulbs,

we are thankful for what often exceeds hope and expectation! 

From Fancy's Dream of a plethora of colorful dahlias....

to bushy reluctant bloomers 

that buried the planters until I moved them

From barren field with dust flying to a sweep of golden butterfly-like flutters...

From blank canvas....

...to our Creator's Masterpieces!!

A reflection and reply to this poem from May...

Once Upon a Wistful Morrow (demands full attention now)

Spring's Wistful Morrow-World, my dear, has now been nearly spent..

Its planted plot and furrow unfurled in fruit-testament

Hope, giddy with spring's fantasy of flowers, bears the yoke

Of disappointment and delight; for blooms are not bespoke

And so we choose to cherish what was granted, midst withheld

Before the present perishes as past and future meld

Where we, all struggling students 'neath the tutelage of God

Are learning patient prudence, for no hand can force a bud

Or undo, what in Eden, routed man's eternal rest

As Eve and Adam doubted and put God's Word to the test

Where the infested ground we till still yields to human race

The bread we eat, the flower frill, like emblems of God's grace

Where, though spring's Wistful Morrow may not unfold as we planned

We know both joy and sorrow's plume are cradled in God's Hand

© Janet Martin

And the sunrise was no slouch either!!!

The last pic in my spring post made me a bit teary...

These tots seem so much bigger already!

Supremely Blessed or Of Fond Farewells

Tonight I bid farewell to August as well as

another summer-season routine of childcare.

Others are bidding farewell this time of year to

students leaving for far-away schools.

Some are suffering the pain of permanent earthly farewells!

What a blessing to love enough to

suffer the pangs of fond farewells!

"I don't want to be rude" said Little girl

"but I feel like I just need to run!"

...and I looked at her and said,

"oh, by all means, run to your hearts content!"💖😊😍

...and run they do taking after Father Time with dust flying at their heels!

Draining every last drop from the joy of the moment!

....leaving so many smiling traces in our faces...

(they named one of these peaches Jim!)😂

(and yes, we will be peeling some of our fruit before we eat it!)😅

...planting and plucking a sense of flowers

in/from the gardens of our hearts...

May we all be blessed, as to bear

Love’s tenderest contests of care

The aching, raking throb that tugs

As words give way to wordless hugs

As bitter-sweetest hunger swells

In heart-tempests of fond farewells

May we all be blessed, as to know

The wresting pangs of letting go

Of searing heartstrings stretched and stretched

Until there is no heartstring left

As love and longing toll soul-bells

In clanging, twanging fond farewells

May we all be blessed, as to feel

The raw essence of silk and steel

Entwined about the inmost crux

Of joy and sorrow’s sacred flux

Between shorelines no ocean quells

As we endure love’s fond farewells

May we all be blessed, as to learn

The best and worst of no return

Where time never replays a day

And all that is can never stay

As arms and hearts weather the swells

Of parting’s precious, fond farewells

We thank love’s Giver for the gifts

That try us with life’s dearest rifts

Reminding us within its test

That we have been Supremely Blessed

Both king and beggar as Time fells

Castles of touch with fond farewells

© Janet Martin

To all the students the world over heading out...

an Irish Blessing

These Are August Days...(part 3)

These Are August Days (part 1) was composed at the beginning of August

These are August Days (part 2) was composed in the middle

Now here at the close of this most enchanting month of all, Part 3!

 

 

  

 

 

These are the days when summer plays a love song on heart-strings

When time is blurred like the whirred motion of humming-bird wings

When garden wealth thrills healthy appetites with vegetables

When fruit of toil spills from the soil in rainbow-miracles

When zinnias grin, so dapper in sun hats, cheery and bright

When the shrill trill of crickets will permeate day and night

When bounty jarred and clouds unbarred inspire thankful prayers

When children play the livelong day unbothered by life’s cares

And morning waits to part dawn’s gates and rouse the rosy sun

When eventide hastens its stride before work-day is done

When canning pots are always hot; tomatoes in their prime

Are plucked and peeled and cooked and sealed for winter’s summer-time

When blooms and butterflies and skies lure eyes to feast and feast

Because today will soon fall prey to Bygone’s hungry beast

When we, with senses charged enlarge the spectrum of delight

To scale joy’s stem, inhale its gem with awe-struck appetite

These are the days easy to praise He from Whom blessings flow

Where bronzed and purpled fronds and shadow steeples steal the show

Where we cannot bear to look far beyond the now and here

In case we miss the present bliss of August’s atmosphere

…of kitchen sauna days upon us that we dare not waste

Of glean and measure garden treasure, simmer, stir and taste

Vinegar, sugar and pickling spice aromas waft

While flower bowers shower earth with tears, tattered and soft

The culmination of elation before autumn’s toll

Reverberates through weathered grates to spark in summer’s soul

An endless happiness because of what was and will be

As a key change starts to arrange next August’s symphony

Where there could be no harvest without first the planted seed

Where winter’s wise hiatus replenishes nature’s need

Where, while the isle to August-next, seems lost on some far shore

Aha, soon we will be perplexed to find it near once more

…futile to yell, fret or rebel against time’s resolved pace

Better to taste the holy haste of life’s momentous grace

And linger longer, in our younger morrow’s yesterdays

Where on a blur of blue larkspur petals, Für Elise plays

These are the days when mint-tint haze drapes daybreak’s slow entrance

When here and there a scarlet flare spikes green-leaf dominance

When something in the air akin to weeping, bids us fight

To savor the full flavor of each moment-morsel bite

To drink in the crescendo of love before letting go

Before we empathize with good-byes strewn in petal-snow

To labor for far more than temporal four-season surge

To remember the Ember that no human hand can purge

Ah, these are summer’s glory-days, ablaze with golden rod

With gladiola-hallelujah handiwork by God

With stubbled sweep of grain-field reaped, slopes steeped in hopes of corn

Beauty and duty tangle in spangles of morn to morn

These are the days that constantly amaze and edify

Reminding us, amidst the fuss, of lifetimes slipping by

For our days are likened to the flower of the field

We fade and fall and all but the soul, to dust’s Must will yield

These are the day we cherish as they perish, wonder-blithe

A living prayer of life aware of death’s encroaching scythe

While wild grass strums That which becomes what vanishes away

Where dust and ash soon snuff the splash of summer’s workaday

These are the days highlighting ways that steal childhood and youth

Time’s evidence climbs fences; graces faces with its truth

A dusky deep of tides that sweep and ebb with sweet delight

Leaving behind a bowl of rinds stripped of each juicy bite

© Janet Martin

Happy Last day of August 2022! 

What a stunning debut!

Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.

Heb.13:8