When God sends us,
trials along our way
on our knees we need
to get down and pray.

For we will need,
a lot of His strength
so to keep our fear
at arm’s length.

When God delivers,
what to us is a blow
to the throne of grace
we need to at once go.

For we need not panic,
or think that it’s odd
for these flaming testings
to come from God.

When God sends us,
trials fiery and blazing
just think about the joy
for you that is awaiting!

~~~~~~~~~~

1 Peter 4:12-13

Beloved, think it not strange
concerning the fiery trial
which is to try you, as though
some strange thing happened
unto you:

But rejoice, inasmuch
as ye are partakers of
Christ’s sufferings;
that, when his glory
shall be revealed,
ye may be glad also
with exceeding joy.

King James Version
Public Domain

Copyright 2020
Deborah…

You slip away

like a morning dream,

fading, in the bliss of sunshine,

in the forgotten meadows of fall.

P-38 in the Pacific

Perhaps Colonel Ben Kelsey, a P-38 test pilot, summed up the war bird’s legacy best of all. “(That) comfortable old cluck,” he said, “would fly like hell, fight like a wasp upstairs, and land like a butterfly.”

The P-38 was the most successful USAAF fighter in the Pacific War. It served with four separate air forces, spread out from Australia to Alaska. The most successful American Ace of the Second World War, Major Richard Bong, scored all 40 of his victories flying the P-38 Lightning over the Pacific.

P-38

The 11th Air Force was allocated the task of defending the Aleutian Islands, in the far north of the Pacific. There the extra reliability provided by the twin engines of the P-38 was essential, with missions being flown over long distances and in poor weather. The first P-38 victories of the war fell to pilots of the…

Whilst attempting to categorise the zillions of poetry in my iPhone notes section I came across the following ditty. It made me smile and feel a touch melancholic at the same time as it feels like such a long time since I was last able to breath in sea air!

The Salty Sailor

The Salty Sailor said few words

His hands did all the speaking

Besides his tipsy vowels were slurred

His holey boots were leaking

And naval rum was his best chum

They‘d weathered life together

Life out at sea could be humdrum

So glum when you’re in tethers

The Salty Sailor’s face was tanned

A red-brown bag of leather

Now that he had returned to land

He hoped he’d stay forever

But as the salt came to a holt

His landlocked legs grew idle

The Salty Sailor made a bolt

Back to a life more tidal

Frailty the stuff of life where burdens lie, and people bury
Unsung songs, misery, and grave hardships twice we carry

Bruises moving like brown tadpoles in a dry southern creek
Voices shallow telling lies like traitors when they dare speak

My heart is broken by daggers thrown from a vengeful voice
Choosing kindness gifted in golden threads is an angel’s choice

Tenderness lies bound upon my shoulder like a wounded thing
As bitter words fly with angry winds and birds that cannot sing

Oh my unrepentant friend,
don’t think you are good
for not one person . . .
does as they should.

That hate that you have,
embedded in your heart
will keep you and God
distant and far apart.

Oh, my tolerant friend,
don’t you be deceived
for everyone by sin
is sick and diseased.

By your liberal thinking,
you are being lead astray
the road you’re now on
is not the narrow way.

Oh, my progressive friends,
for you it’s not too late . . .
to turn back to the truth
leading to the straight gate!

~~~~~~~~~~

Matthew 7:13-14

Enter ye in at the strait gate:
for wide is the gate, and broad
is the way, that leadeth to
destruction, and many there
be which go in thereat:

Because strait is the gate,
and narrow is the way,
which leadeth unto life,
and few there be that find it.

Winter does not empathize
with withered branches or
displaced birds fleeing waves
of frozen breath
Her howling wind is a laugh out loud
and she hasn’t the grace to cover her mouth.
A tease of holly and evergreen flicker
at the curve of her billowed boughs
glistening folds and hallowed mounds
drift in other worldly sighs
ensnared by her exquisite binds.

art by Karol Bak