Christmas Poem
The wish-worn stars in the sleepless sky
Burned through the dim aura of the buzzing highway
Our rumbling growl rendered moot
In their silence, and along the route
I could feel the wind’s winding sigh say,
For all the monsters we love so well,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
A hundred bad jokes called towns gone by,
A thousand cookie-clutter streets, the names don’t stick,
Where I’ve hidden grails to serve the crown,
Had November knock me down,
And stern December start to kick
But to lift my loyalties once I fell,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
I discarded my heart; I wouldn’t see it starved
On the cell-padding clichés that we’re all fed
Of faith, frailty, self forgiveness, and friends,
The buy-buy birdie’s song never ends
While beauty is wilting, passion is dead,
But for all the lies a machine can sell,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
I ventured uptown to the man who’d carved
My cold little world from the ice in his past
He stepped lightly down from his ivy throne,
And embraced me as one of his own,
“Merry Christmas,” he said, “Come in at last!
“I’ve missed you more than I can tell.”
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
With avuncular avarice he led me in,
Holy bibles, holly baubles, a hallway of light
Half-way, a house, part-way, a shrine,
In deed it was his, but indeed felt like mine
The scenes of my youth just out of sight
And I wistfully sighed through my old world’s shell,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
“Young gun,” he breathed through carol’s din,
“Won’t you tell me why you’ve always shunned
My Christmas invitations up until now?”
I’ve always kept my family line somehow
Missile-toed, Christ - massacred, even - young gunned
Down, like the truth when I’ve no pen to quell
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
“Christmas is for children who haven’t discerned
The eternal winter of the human heart,” I cut,
“Wasn’t it you who always told
Me to beware the ravenous cold
In the world’s greedy ways? I could’ve shut
It out with its lies, not raced it to hell”
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
“Oh, my dear boy, all that you have learned
I’d earned for thinking my frail flippancy wise
But, through affliction, affection I’ve known;
In humanity’s hands reared, I’ve grown
Nursed in the warmth behind a stranger’s sere eyes.”
But memory surged to break the spell.
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
We sat in silence, and through the window shone
His neighbour’s lights, every colour blinking, winking
Some secret to me, each recalling
Memories of pleasure, snow was falling.
He said, “It’s good to have you back.” Oh, what was I thinking?
I’m only blown back when my heart’s sails swell
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
But, “I’m not so sure that I’ve ever been gone,
Or maybe I’m not sure I’ve come back; I live
But to aver my childhood advice,
For the world has shown me my soul of ice.
It’s not my fellow man that I can’t trust or forgive.”
But for all the stories my guilt could propel,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
He offered a walk, and beneath a lonely moon
We searched for some connection down shadow-strewn streets
In a while he said, “Have a little faith,”
And his breath was a writhing wraith
In the wind that blew vagrants like a few sheets
And a church in the dark rang an ancient bell,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
“After all I’ve done to you, why, so soon,
Do you love and trust me?” I blurted in spite of my pride
“Well, if I teach you anything,
Let it be that each winter answers to spring,
And a soul can melt.” And we shuffled inside
The quaint little church, sweet parallel,
Oh, noel, a last noel.
Burned through the dim aura of the buzzing highway
Our rumbling growl rendered moot
In their silence, and along the route
I could feel the wind’s winding sigh say,
For all the monsters we love so well,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
A hundred bad jokes called towns gone by,
A thousand cookie-clutter streets, the names don’t stick,
Where I’ve hidden grails to serve the crown,
Had November knock me down,
And stern December start to kick
But to lift my loyalties once I fell,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
I discarded my heart; I wouldn’t see it starved
On the cell-padding clichés that we’re all fed
Of faith, frailty, self forgiveness, and friends,
The buy-buy birdie’s song never ends
While beauty is wilting, passion is dead,
But for all the lies a machine can sell,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
I ventured uptown to the man who’d carved
My cold little world from the ice in his past
He stepped lightly down from his ivy throne,
And embraced me as one of his own,
“Merry Christmas,” he said, “Come in at last!
“I’ve missed you more than I can tell.”
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
With avuncular avarice he led me in,
Holy bibles, holly baubles, a hallway of light
Half-way, a house, part-way, a shrine,
In deed it was his, but indeed felt like mine
The scenes of my youth just out of sight
And I wistfully sighed through my old world’s shell,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
“Young gun,” he breathed through carol’s din,
“Won’t you tell me why you’ve always shunned
My Christmas invitations up until now?”
I’ve always kept my family line somehow
Missile-toed, Christ - massacred, even - young gunned
Down, like the truth when I’ve no pen to quell
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
“Christmas is for children who haven’t discerned
The eternal winter of the human heart,” I cut,
“Wasn’t it you who always told
Me to beware the ravenous cold
In the world’s greedy ways? I could’ve shut
It out with its lies, not raced it to hell”
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
“Oh, my dear boy, all that you have learned
I’d earned for thinking my frail flippancy wise
But, through affliction, affection I’ve known;
In humanity’s hands reared, I’ve grown
Nursed in the warmth behind a stranger’s sere eyes.”
But memory surged to break the spell.
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
We sat in silence, and through the window shone
His neighbour’s lights, every colour blinking, winking
Some secret to me, each recalling
Memories of pleasure, snow was falling.
He said, “It’s good to have you back.” Oh, what was I thinking?
I’m only blown back when my heart’s sails swell
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
But, “I’m not so sure that I’ve ever been gone,
Or maybe I’m not sure I’ve come back; I live
But to aver my childhood advice,
For the world has shown me my soul of ice.
It’s not my fellow man that I can’t trust or forgive.”
But for all the stories my guilt could propel,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
He offered a walk, and beneath a lonely moon
We searched for some connection down shadow-strewn streets
In a while he said, “Have a little faith,”
And his breath was a writhing wraith
In the wind that blew vagrants like a few sheets
And a church in the dark rang an ancient bell,
O! Noel! Alas, noel!
“After all I’ve done to you, why, so soon,
Do you love and trust me?” I blurted in spite of my pride
“Well, if I teach you anything,
Let it be that each winter answers to spring,
And a soul can melt.” And we shuffled inside
The quaint little church, sweet parallel,
Oh, noel, a last noel.