Where Autumn is Life's Sister...

This morning I asked Victoria to take a picture as a keepsake of the sacred commonplace...

Of countless times in our 34 years of marriage,

Jim realizing, he could arrange his route to come by the house

to grab a coffee and breakfast sandwich etc.

giving me a heads-up call when he is almost here so he can just pull over,

trade empty containers for full ones

and carry on with a thank-you and see you in a few days...

As I turned and looked at the yard, frigid with first snowflakes

 but clinging valiantly to its glow of gold

like Woman vainly gripping the fraying edges of the garb of middle age,

 the need for this poem of why I love Autumn so much,

 washed over me...

The woo of purple blue scarves draped on skyline filigree

The curb appeal of Today, caped in Autumn’s finery

The holiness of hunger no five-star meal can assuage

The happiness of wonder too epic for ink and page

The glory of the hilltop cascading its color-roar

Like an Artist’s tipped palette immersing the valley floor

The rush of season-splendor undulating, wave on wave

An orchestra of grandeur serenading the cold grave

As sweep of rain song clinches nature’s prey to gray archives

Gold leaves like drunken finches sail from trees in wild nose dives

The sorrow of surrender and its bittersweet relief

Time’s touch, so harsh, yet tender in the binding of the sheaf

The land, a grand portrayal of meager glimpses of He

Who overflows earth’s table with fringes of majesty

The bright October afternoon poured from welkin canteen

In a mirage-collage of June’s peppermint, misty green

July’s gold wheat fields rippling, August’s aquamarine sea

September’s orchards twinkling like glass jars of rosehip tea

The poet, as she grapples with time’s ever-ebbing swell

Of blossoms turned to apples, of hello turned to farewell

The sense of Something Sacred swirling, slipping, tripping by

An elfin ballerina twirling on a splash of sky

A sentimental molding of love’s carousel of crumbs

Of holding soon enfolding what all letting go becomes

An impression of moments caught like petals in an urn

Of girls becoming women in a world of no return

Of murmurs snared from summers sparkling like a bit of brook

Through pages filled with darkling pictures tucked into a book

Where autumn is Life’s sister walking through joy rife with grief

An empathetic whisper unraveling leaf by leaf

© Janet Martin

A Sonnet of Wonderment/Confoundment

Jer.32:17

‘Ah, Lord GOD! Behold, You have made the heavens and the earth

by Your great power and outstretched arm.

There is nothing too hard for You.

Time cannot shift the Hand that tunes the tide

That manifests God’s ancient covenant

That ebbs and flows across the countryside

To author amaranthine wonderment

Where we could shout until no voice is left

The height and breadth of beauty to descry

Only to concede mortal is bereft

Of words to adequately gratify

…the thirst that bursts into a hymn of praise

Too grand for script of syllable and rhyme

To God, who never ceases to amaze

Unphased, He proves the changeless ways of Time

And rouses from Confoundment's inept mold 

Agape stutters of 'Ah, Lord God, behold.'

© Janet Martin

Gen.8:22

“While the earth remains, 

Seedtime and harvest, 

Cold and heat, 

Winter and summer,

 And day and night 

Shall not cease.”

Psalm 40:5
Many, O LORD my God, are the wonders You have done,

 and the plans You have for us--

none can compare to You--

if I proclaim and declare them, 

they are more than I can count.

Psalm 111:2

Great are the works of the LORD;

 they are pondered by all who delight in them.

Psalm 92:5
How great are Your works, O LORD, 

how deep are Your thoughts!

A 'Sister' Poem

 

My sisters-left to right, youngest to oldest with mom

(She took the sister-pic) went out today to

celebrate my youngest sister's 50th birthday!

A most, precious day💖

Happy 50th, Baby Sis!

Dear mother... (turning 80 on Nov.1st, Lord willing)

We share a sweet comradery

A bond second to none

Where once upon our mother’s knee

Its beauty was begun

Where once upon a little girl

We could not comprehend

The oyster that concealed the pearl

Of both sister and friend

The forge of home-sweet-work-and-play

And tit-for-tat-and such

Disguised the precious, priceless fray

Soft-tumbling through our touch

Where, in the warp and weave of years

That slip and spill and sweep

The brunt of love and life endears

Us to its flying leap

And to the quirks that make us, Us

For better or worse, oh

We laugh, misunderstand and fuss

And love each other so

And marvel at the way time trips

Through youth and middle age

And help each other come to grips

With each new, untried stage

While sharing books and recipes

And strolls down memory lane

And tugs and hugs and sympathies

With no need to explain

While marveling at what unfurls

Like pearls, caught in a jar

Where we will always be ‘mom’s girls’

However old we are

Where what began on mother’s knee

Continues the fine art

Of what sisters will always be

Forever young at heart

© Janet Martin

The Gift of Here and Now

 

How swift Here-and Now's moment-spheres

Augment the tent of yesteryears...

Yesterday I collected autumn colours for lunch (rainbow Swiss Chard)...

and air-fried beets with feta cheese (5-star meal!)

...and marigolds, dried for tea!

One large bowl of flowers when dried

fit into this jar!

What is can never stay; hello soon farewell kissed

The golden summer day soon drawn away on autumn mist

The garden green and young soon gleaned of harvest fare

The boldness of the silver tongue soon wizened by life’s care

To everything a time; this clime where seasons flow

A little like a pantomime of hold and letting go

A little like a page where ballerinas twirl

Like autumn leaves across a stage that steals the little girl

What is soon disappears, a joy and sorrow spree

Bittersweet fleet of smiles and tears that sparkle out to sea

Duty and beauty’s sands like treasures from a trove

That sparkle through our hearts and hands all for the sake of love

So then, because of how swift seasons rise and fall

Let’s use the gift of here and now to its full potential

To do the best we can to shoulder what we ought

For the welfare of fellowman and the glory of God

© Janet Martin

A last-minute invitation to Daughter and children made the meal ever-so-much-more memorable!

Granddaughter decided to bring alpha-getti when she heard what was on the menu😂

Baby just cooed and smiled (between gramma-cuddles, naturally!)

Dear Granddaughter...here's to a whole winter-long of tea-parties!

(And Grandsonny too, but he prefers stirring it to drinking it😍)

We've dubbed this blend (fresh mint, lavender and marigold)

 Azerbaijan Tea thanks to all the varieties showcased on Country Life Vlog

Phil.4:8

Finally, brothers and sisters, 

whatever is true, 

whatever is noble, 

whatever is right, 

whatever is pure, 

whatever is lovely, 

whatever is admirable—

if anything is excellent or praiseworthy

—think about such things.

Autumn Aria

 

Overhead and underneath

Autumn spreads wreath over wreath

Wraps the shiver of earth’s eaves

In an ambience of leaves

Where vermilion lamplight flicks

On gazillion woodland wicks

Where the poet cannot snare

The full essence of the flare

For ink cannot catch the sigh

Of Autumn’s Leaf-Lullaby

Or the dance of sun and rain

Across landscape's counterpane

Or the sweeping surge of seas

Hidden by a verge of trees

Or the orchestra that slipped

From a stage that windsong stripped

© Janet Martin

Fortune of Favour

Sometimes it's easy to lose sight of

More than Morning rolling over the skyline, isn't it?!

A burnished ambience swaddles the earth as the heavens seem torn between rain and sun!

...for now, sunshine seems to be triumphing! 

From the Giver to the taker rolls the toll of morning tide

Like a blushing river rushing over skylines far and wide

Universal, kind dispersal of God’s mercy; we embark

Hope and heartache humbly partake of the gift that rends the dark

From the Teacher to the reaching readiness of creature call

Altogether, born to weather whatsoever will befall

Where the earning of our learning often startles me and you

With the ruing and undoing of so much we thought we knew

From God’s love that will not falter to the altar of Today

Spills a flood of grace and goodness time’s epic ebb cannot sway

From His table we are able to partake of mercy’s feast

Gaze in wonder at hope’s grandeur from the greatest to the least

From the Giver to the taker mankind’s numbered days decline

Growing older as we shoulder ways that chasten and refine

Tender splendor, Healer, Mender of the brokenness we bear

From the Giver to the taker, spills our kind Creator's care

Oh, how hard would be the heartache, how melancholy each mile

Without Hope’s immortal portal to comfort and reconcile

As we press toward the mark where darkness and dread disappear

From the Giver to the taker brims love’s clarion hymn of cheer

From the Giver to the taker, what fortune of favor flows

From our Father up in Heaven what redemption He bestows

Oh, what depth and height and breadth, His riches none can comprehend

God, faith's author and perfector, God, man's protector and Friend

© Janet Martin

Rom.11:33-36

O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!

 how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!

For who hath known the mind of the Lord? 

or who hath been his counsellor?

Or who hath first given to him, 

and it shall be recompensed unto him again?

For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: 

to whom be glory forever. 

Amen.

A wonderful hymn of hope and worship to begin a new week!

Christ the True and Better (Lyric Video) - Matt Boswell & Matt Papa

Already I Am Mourning...

'Oh!' I sighed/moaned, 'When am I going to get time to read all of these beautiful books

full of ever-so-fantastic writing?!'

'You won't' came my daughter Victoria's instant reply.

'That's the sad truth about owning a library! 

You will never read all of the books!'

...But they are still nice to have nearby, like comfortable, wise, old friends.

Already I am mourning all the ways we didn’t meet

I didn’t linger in the leaves you scattered at my feet

I never did discover what you made me think or say

Or needed to recover as your whisper slipped away

The solace that we found in one another’s company

The way you wound yourself around places inside of me

The way you would have kissed me if I’d given you a chance

The way I would have missed you after our parting dance

After the afternoon we didn’t spend, just you and I

With not a thing between us but perhaps a parchment sigh

The friends we could have been, darling, does it not break your heart

The way that we will never meet thus we will never part

A little like a flower bloomed unseen and gone to seed

Already I am mourning all the books I didn’t read

© Janet Martin

Lens Awareness

We view other people's lives through the lens of our own experiences.

One size does not fit all!!

If only we remembered that the window we peer through

Is not a universal, unobstructed point of view

Where, we all dream, hope, hurt and bear the cares of time and place

And no one is beyond the need of sympathetic grace 

While one is celebrating a victorious delight

Another is debating whether life is worth the fight

 The highs and lows of thorns and roses scatter in the wake

Of what becomes the lens through which we view life's give and take

Where soon a season disappears, turned into memories

Laughter and tears unrav'ling years like leaves unravel trees

While, weathering the wounds and wonders of gladness and gall

Of All-in-this-together but one lens does not fit all

Some sorrows flash like neon signs, some lodge deep in the heart

Not one of us can see behind the facade of the art

Where we are all God's workmanship, all simply fellowmen

Not one of us fully equipped to wield the Poet's Pen

Without thought of the welfare of each other first in mind

Because the lenses we look through are each one-of-a-kind

© Janet Martin

Phil.2:4

Let each of you look out not only for his own interests,

 but also for the interests of others.