I’m very excited to welcome today’s Summer Spotlight: Inspirational Stories to Inspire You guest Darlene Franklin. She brings with her some poems she wrote and gives us a little background on each one. I love poetry, and I find I often neglect to read it and feed that part of myself. So I’m glad her “stories” for today are in the poetic form. Enjoy!

Poetry. Darlene Franklin

A few years ago I dabbled in poetry for a month or two, and self-published my  first book of poetry (When Pines Whisper).

When this year’s Poem a Day challenge came up this April, I jumped into it with both feet. I enjoyed it so much, that I’ve continued in May and June as well, only now I’m having to create my own prompts and locate my own poetic forms.

So today I share the brain process that led to the poem – and the poetry that I trust will point you towards our Lord!

One poetry site has challenged us to write a Welsh form known as a “Cyrch a chwta,”  with a set meter and rhyme scheme. I had been wrestling with Galatians 5:1 for a devotional I’m writing, trying to find dimensions to it beyond the Judaizer debate that plagued the early church. How do we live in freedom?

GALATIANS 5:1

Set free to live in freedom

Laws are given as albums

Looking into how faith hums

Keys to good life the outcome

Their depths you can never plumb

Line by line they keep on giving

Freest living is not dumb

Darlene Franklin c2018

The day’s form is Pi-Archimedes, six unrhymed lines, each line with the number of words in the first six digits of the number Pi: 3-1-4-1-5-9. This time I’m speaking of another verse for a devotion, Proverbs 27:1

Proverbs 27:1

 Yesterday is past

Unchangeable

I’ll never reach tomorrow

Unpredictable

One day at a time

To keep promises, love my family, and serve God

 Darlene Franklin 2018

The letter for the day was q, and the color was black-and-white. I thought of a true/false quiz, and used the Japanese Waka form to express a basic truth. How prepared am I for the either-or choices life presents to me?

Choosing Either-or

When life’s true-false quiz

Demands choices, either-or,

Place your trust in God

And have your answer ready.

Only He can ace the test.

 Darlene Franklin c2018

On the day the assigned letters were x-z, the word of “xyst,” which means something similar to a veranda.  The form is a jumping rhyme; each line is one syllable longer than the previous line, growing from six syllables to ten.

In this case, I didn’t start out planning a spiritual poem, but it came as I looked for rhymes and thoughts to go with “xyst.” When my thoughts take an inward turn, and I trust God to show me the way.

INSIDE THE VERANDA

Walking inside the xyst,

Wondering why I’d exist,

When God’s my guide, He holds my wrist.

His purpose expands my life’s wide list

Even if I spied the way through a mist.

Darlene Franklin C2018

I love this! I had no idea there were so many different forms of poetry that I’d never heard of. Thank you, Darlene, for sharing. I hope you enjoyed a sneak peek at Darlene’s poetic side.

Best-selling Amazon and ECPA author Darlene Franklin’s greatest claim to fame is that she continues to write from a nursing home. She keeps going because God keeps giving her more assignments. She’s written more than fifty-five fiction and nonfiction books, including Pray Through the Bible in a Year (https://amzn.to/2GOZUVz) and Of Cash and Cats in Love Comes on Kitten Paws (https://amzn.to/2Lf3hIN).  Check out a complete list of her books at https://amzn.to/2Lv3Gaa and keep up with her online at https://www.facebook.com/DarleneFranklinFun/.

Darlene’s newest release is one of two romantic novellas where fairy tales do come true in Seeking Cinderella.

CINDERELLA’S BOOT
Cynthia Ellen Cooper—known affectionately as “Cinderella”—left her wedding boot in the dust when she ran away from her wedding to work on a sheep station in Australia.

Four years later, she’s back home—and so is her ex-fiancé, now a DVM from Oklahoma State University. They reach a truce and work side by side in his father’s animal clinic.

Cyn soon discovers she wants more—but she has to battle bad history and a demanding pet owner for Keith’s attention.

How can Cinderella find a second chance at love?

HILLBILLY CINDERELLA
When Cindy Lou Hopkins turns twenty-five life will get better. She knows it. She’ll no longer be under the thumb of her stepmother Geneva or tormented by her stepsisters. She just has to stay alive that long.

The only kink in her plan for independence is the handsome, Lance Moore, she jokingly calls the town prince. A man who wants to get to know her better. A man Cindy isn’t worthy to be in the same room as.

When Lance throws a barn dance, Cindy is determined to have one night with him that will carry her through the rest of her life. Can she set aside prejudices from a bygone time and embrace her happily ever after?

You can find Seeking Cinderella on Amazon now! I will see you next week for another inspirational summer spotlight!