Ship of Fool's Book Group December Bring and Share Poetry (and maybe short fiction)
As we didn't decide on a book for December I thought it would be a good time to share some of our favourite Christmas poetry and books.
Remember that not all texts will be out of copyright so don't post whole poems here, but provide links instead.
I'll post links to some of my favourites later on in the month, but feel free to dive in now.
Remember that not all texts will be out of copyright so don't post whole poems here, but provide links instead.
I'll post links to some of my favourites later on in the month, but feel free to dive in now.
Comments
This was the moment when nothing
Happened. Only dull peace
Sprawled boringly over the earth.
Then there’s What the Donkey Saw, which does have a thought provoking last couplet.
And the even more thought provoking The Wicked Fairy at the Manger, with a real punch at the end.
We have a local actor here who for about 20 years has done performances every Christmas of a one-man show called "Penning the Carol," which is about Charles Dickens writing "A Christmas Carol" in which he somehow manages to become Dickens, Scrooge, and all the other characters while telling the story. I've seen it several times and it's an amazing performance.
Sorry, that's theatre not poetry, but I'm always intrigued by how that one story can be re-told, performed, and adapted in so many different ways!
Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.
“Now they are all on their knees,”
An elder said as we sat in a flock
It is the story of how a young lady, her family and eventually the town cope when her True Love' follows the example of the lover in The Twelve Days of Christmas, and sends her all the items listed that song. Bear in mind that on each day she receives all the items listed for that day, not just the one that is next on the list. Although this causes a few problems, there is, of course, a happy ending.
https://allpoetry.com/poem/8493411-Christmas-by-Sir-John-Betjeman[url][/url]
I too love his poetry and am indifferent about his fiction.
My views on Hardy changed forever once I read he thought of himself primarily as a poet.
U A Fanthorpe's "What The Donkey Saw" is one of my favourites.
I’m not really a Dickens fan but do like A Christmas Carol. ‘Are there not workhouses’ seems as relevant today as it was then.
In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,
In the bleak midwinter, long ago.
In contrast a contemporary and more audacious poem about Mary giving birth to Jesus, Alla Renee Bozarth's Before Jesus:
Before his cry, her cry.
Before his sweat of blood, her bleeding and tears.
Before his offering, hers.
Oh, thank you! I'd forgotten about that one and have just found and reread it for the first time in years.
I like Charles Causley's poetry, and this ones seems right for the time of year.
Ballad of the Bread Man.
'Not today they said'.
Elegy in a Country Churchyard
BY G. K. Chesterton.
The men that worked for England
They have their graves at home:
And birds and bees of England
About the cross can roam.
But they that fought for England,
Following a falling star,
Alas, alas for England
They have their graves afar.
And they that rule in England,
In stately conclave met,
Alas, alas for England,
They have no graves as yet.
A couple of Yule/Solstice poems I often read on the shortest day of the year, or in our mid-winter:
Susan Cooper's The Shortest Day[/i]
So the Shortest Day came and the year died
And everywhere down the centuries of the snow‐white world
Came people singing, dancing,
To drive the dark away.
Wallace Stevens The Snow Man
One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and the boughs
Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;
And have been cold a long time.
And Wendell Berry's very short poem To Know the Dark
To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.
This is one of my favourites too and I return to it every year. I think for me that the depth you refer to draws me from Winter into the mystery of Christmas
I love this poem too both for it's crescendo of meaning but also for the imagery in the early verses which takes me back to my childhood. A poignant mix!
That's a favorite. I included snippets from the last three verses of Betjeman in the last sermon I gave before retiring. It was on Christmas I, where the gospel text is John 1, and it reminds me of the line The Maker of the stars and sea/Become a Child on earth for me ?
And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:
"Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown".
And he replied:
"Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God.
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way".
So I went forth, and finding the Hand of God, trod gladly into the night.
And He led me towards the hills and the breaking of day in the lone East.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gate_of_the_Year
I have news for you
The stag bells, winter snows, summer is gone.
Wind high and cold, the sun low, short its course
The sea running high.
Deep red the bracken, its shape is lost
The wild goose has raised its accustomed cry
Cold has seized the birds’ wings
Season of ice
This is my news.
I always put that one in our church bulletin on the weekend closest to New Year's. It's a favourite of mine.
If you want, the Virgin will come walking down the road
pregnant with the Holy and say,
“I need shelter for the night.
I love that more each time I read it. I am intermittently suffering from the winter blues (cue stereotyped guitar riff) this year, and in my mind I can see the sage entering the firelight and crying "Hvaet!" before evoking a world outside, far outside, of workplace windows and the X32 bus.