The day after Christmas

T’was the day after Christmas
And all through the house
Few creatures wer stirring
'Cept maybe a mouse

The stockings were ravaged
The tree nearly bare
The kids were all tired
Of toys they could share

Guests are now packed
For their drive home
The kitchen's been sacked
Like it was ancient Rome

by himself,
with thanks to Clement Moore

all bare under the tree

Photo by J. Harrington

We’ve made it through another one and are very grateful for the happy feelings, good times, and healthy and tasty food, all shared with family extraordinaire. Yesterday’s snow was manageable although it fell while the Better Half was driving our son back to his group home while I returned to our home to tend dogs. We met back at the Daughter Person / Son-In-Law’s just as the snow was ending. What’s forecast for tonight may or may not be as readily traversable come morning. And there’s another wave coming Tuesday? It’s starting to feel like an old fashioned North Country winter, but only if we avvoid freezing rain and drizzle.

One of the presents in my stocking was a copy of All Creation Waits, The Advent Mystery of New Beginnings. I do not intent to put it aside until next year, it looks too interesting: reflections “on how wild animals adapt when darkness and cold descend.” Perhaps I’ll learn something to help get us to April. Next year, come December, I hope to share it with out granddaughter, who by then will be two years+. Christmas with children is far, far superior to one without. Is it time to start a national campaign to bring back extended families?

Christmas Night

By Conrad Hilberry

Let midnight gather up the wind   

and the cry of tires on bitter snow.   

Let midnight call the cold dogs home,   

sleet in their fur—last one can blow   

the streetlights out.   If children sleep   

after the day’s unfoldings, the wheel   

of gifts and griefs, may their breathing   

ease the strange hollowness we feel.   

Let midnight draw whoever’s left   

to the grate where a burnt-out log unrolls   

low mutterings of smoke until   

a small fire wakes in its crib of coals.

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