Four Christmas Poems, 2004

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	Thanksgiving Is the Flight to Christmas
	Through sixty-eight years, including twenty-four November and ought four, I’ve had Thanksgivings set, until the blindside entry aha! of yesterday: It’s just that the name is giving thanks, but word reversal hides, then shifts the tone, mostly to giving ourselves this great and gluttonous feast with loves and friends that heralds, we say, the season of holidays for getting and giving the gifts of the year. But I’m brought back to giving thanks, mostly thanks. That gratitude’s caught like a deer in lights of my attention. I see those doe-soft eyes, mute of demand, but know they carry a radiant charge lasering right to the center no cougar or bear among us can touch. For gratitude, not human, grows from the soul, enthus- iasm the mate—in integration their salving presence strengthens and lengthens our life. They lead me lightly through the dinner, so food on wings of gratitude, enthus- iasm becomes a flight of energy, not heading to sleep in heavy hours. Then Christmas—mass of Christ, its dimness and distance closing by days to bright and dear, so strong its giving embraces the swarm of merchants peaking their year within its summit spirit—weans our gratitude, enthusiasm . . . to give, receive completely.

Ronald Jorgensen
25 November 2004-12 November 2005
© Ronald Jorgensen

Sonnet on Getting Ready for Christmas

For some the campaign comes on a long whistle . . .
That early effort grows in the months’ haul
to station twenty-five, December’s epistle
of every imagination’s beauty. Roll call:

Sweets and savories, wreaths and trees’ gleams,
lights until the night’s haunted with wishes
by couples and families, dance dreams
in presents’ love made visible, dishes’

feasting to nourish the warmth of heart’s communion,
far more . . . no words. But on a deeper track—
so long, so wide—misheard as human union,
the engine of our future despite our lack

rolls into fields riot with flowers and sun.
A gasp—oh, loveliness! Oh, power! Oh, One!

Ronald Jorgensen
26 December 2002—14 December 2003
© Ronald Jorgensen

Advent

Led by the multitudes
of hints and hunches, those im-
pulses that puzzle us later,
we come to this ground of songs
and lights, beguiled by the joy
and wonder—superstition?

Then, when we’re diverted,
between the seams of hours,
the stitchings of minutes, that clear
breadth . . . serene . . . comes sea-
like down and all falls still
inside, around. Awakened,

we breathe the brightness of birth.

Ronald Jorgensen
2 December 2002
© Ronald Jorgensen

Note on "Christmas and the New Year"

Note: Tincture here means a tint of color, especially in this use similar to the sun tincturing the sky—as it does at dawn. Vances , unlike advances that often suggests moving beforehand or early, means here to move in the fullness of time when all is ready. I realize the word has not existed before and my introduction involves a willfulness against the direction of some roots, but the sound context recommends itself, I feel, so one can see how it is born coming out of advance . Hail to the new word!

Christmas and the New Year

All beings move to the lip of love
opened wider now, this time of year,
as air carries the tincture of the white dove
descended in our mass of doubt, of fear

which in its peace are held, its light illumed
until that center vances out in sounds
of dawning radiance, now costumed
in joy. The old’s fulfilled, the new abounds.

	Sonnet on Getting Ready for Christmas
	For some the campaign comes on a long whistle . . . That early effort grows in the months’ haul to station twenty-five, December’s epistle of every imagination’s beauty. Roll call: Sweets and savories, wreaths and trees’ gleams, lights until the night’s haunted with wishes by couples and families, dance dreams in presents’ love made visible, dishes’ feasting to nourish the warmth of heart’s communion, far more . . . no words. But on a deeper track— so long, so wide—misheard as human union, the engine of our future despite our lack rolls into fields riot with flowers and sun. A gasp—oh, loveliness! Oh, power! Oh, One!

	Advent
	Led by the multitudes of hints and hunches, those im- pulses that puzzle us later, we come to this ground of songs and lights, beguiled by the joy and wonder—superstition? Then, when we’re diverted, between the seams of hours, the stitchings of minutes, that clear breadth . . . serene . . . comes sea- like down and all falls still inside, around. Awakened, we breathe the brightness of birth.

	Christmas and the New Year
	All beings move to the lip of love opened wider now, this time of year, as air carries the tincture of the white dove descended in our mass of doubt, of fear which in its peace are held, its light illumed until that center vances out in sounds of dawning radiance, now costumed in joy. The old’s fulfilled, the new abounds.