Merry Christmas to All

The Evening Prayer
from the book The Fire on the Hearth in Sleepy Hollow: A Christmas Poem of the Olden Time
(published in 1864)

" BUT now the hour draws near for prayer--
The father takes with reverent air
The Holy Book from well known place
And reads with inward prayer for grace
The holy Gospel's wondrous story--
How angels from the realms of glory
Appeared and sang at Jesus's birth--
"Good will to man and peace on earth"
Then each one kneeling by his chair
The patriarch leads the evening prayer
With earnest heart and simple word
And tremulous lips he thanks the Lord
He had to one so old as he
And sinful as he grieved to be
By blood bought mercy given leave
To see another Christmas eve
And oh to Heaven what praise there goes
Like fragrance from a broken rose
From the old patriarch's trembling prayer
For those who bow beside him there
His children and their children fair
With simple child like form of speech
Which never fails God's ear to reach
He prays that He who came to earth
To take our form by human birth
And knew the feelings of a child
And taught and died and reconciled
Offended Heaven and sinful man
Would by redeeming love and plan
Save him and his loved children all
From the sad ruin of the Fall--
Bring him and his their sins forgiven
To the bright Homestead built in heaven
And fill all years and every clime
With the good cheer of Christmas time"

Poem of Grief

Grief
doesn’t fit neatly
in the little day box
on my calendar
marked out to say
that’s completed
now move on
to the next square

Mourning
doesn’t allow me
to schedule a time
begin feeling the pain
when the chime reminds me
to sorrow and sigh now
or miss the chance

Unexpectedly, sorrow flows
pools in my gut
while a song I try to sing
tunes to the ache
resonates with my hurt
vibrations echoed in tears
even while the waves fade

Remembrance
doesn’t tolerate
the wondrous sight
of a glorious autumn
blood red glowing orange tree
with it’s momentary beauty
for I see only the
crumpled piles underneath
decaying colors evaporating
and long for spring

sm

Urbanesque Poem

Hey you,
young blonde
punk athlete
in the Mercury Sable
seat low and back

playing rap music
so smutty your mother
would cry and your sister
would whomp you
for even owning it

Don't you know that
what goes
in your head
can end up in your
heart?

When Death Comes

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn;
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes
like the measles-pox;

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,

and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth
tending as all music does, toward silence,

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.

When it's over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it is over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.

By Mary Oliver

An Ode to Ear Piercing

"You don't need another hole in your head",
Said my mother when I was a kid.
And asked- no pleaded -"can I get my ears pierced?"
In what I hoped was an irresistable bid.

Made to wait until the more responsible fourteen,
which was deemed the acceptable age ,
and though I don't even remember it now,
I know it was entrance to the current teen rage.

Young married, I remember my brother-in-law,
growing up in a home quite conservative,
coming home one day with a stud in his ear,
his parents annoyed reaction was superlative.

My young daughter next pleaded, though of needles afraid,
that "everyone had them", she'd seen!
"You have to be able to take care of them", I entoned,
And I made her wait until she was a teen.

Fast forward, and she is now married and grown,
and showed up with an extra hoop on the side,
From a tattoo shop with a needle no less
she'd been woosy, but somehow not cried.

And her husband! Our Favorite son-in-law,
had opted for both ears, which is now in,
And we rejoiced that he had stopped short with that,
and didn't go with ink under the skin.

And so here I am the latest example,
of answering a strange kind of call,
But one more piercing was the cry,
and I ran with it down at the mall.

It hurt, and still hurts, and I chose the pain,
(I can't even sleep on that side!)
But, it wasn't for cool, or trendy, or angst,
Or a mistaken type of rebellious pride.

In the end it was simply, "I thought it would be cute"
And "I'm a grown up" to husband I said!
I called my mom to admit and of course she remarked,
"Like you really needed another hole in your head!"