These Are My JOTtings, Part #2

Write Your Poem!

The poem fails when it stays unwrit.
We're losing time to make words fit.
Just pepper it in the reader's mitt,
until a new thought comes.

The days of grace are fading fast
as words of the old preacher cast.
The sins of Earth won't stay and last,
when Judgment reads its sums.

Write your poem! Get it said!
The quicker writ, the quicker read.
The thoughts from you to another's head
will make a lasting mark.

Write your poem! Write today
to send your meaning on its way,
that rhythm, rhyme, or free display,
your motives will embark.

Write your poem! It has worth
to comfort, strengthen, give new birth
to hope, and joy, and greatest mirth,
but sadness rusts.

The sitting face, that stares in space
will soon moth-eaten in its place
be no more than a silent disgrace,
that knows not love, nor trust.

The silence is not the offense
for waiting moments, cleanse and rinse,
until the spices fully mince
to bring us flavor new.

The wrong is stopping with no heart.
Flee hopelessness to the best new start
in Christ, Whose Grace will never part.
He ever makes new you.

by Jay O’Toole
on January 10th, 2026