Christmas Tree

Near the end of his days
My father would still go out,
Some mid-December day,
Into the Iowa countryside
To find a Christmas tree.
Tongue between his teeth,
He would haul it into the house,
Wrestle it into the metal stand,
And string it with colored lights—
The big ones, scratched with age—
The kind where if one goes out,
They all go out.
In those last years,
No other decorations were necessary:
No tinsel, no strands of beads,
No silvered balls that reflect the world
Like a fun-house mirror.
In the early darkness,
He would sit in his easy chair
Basking in the soft light of the tree,
As he listened to carols on the radio.
Perhaps it was enough
To help him be, for a moment,
The little boy collecting coal
Along the train tracks,
Whose Christmas was just
An orange in a stocking,
And a pair of gloves
For cold-reddened fingers,
A boy whose mother was still alive
Cooking a scrawny goose
And filling a house full of love.
That, of course,
Is the light
Which never goes out,
The evergreen thing
That makes the darkest days
Into a Christmas.

Glory

The glory shall be revealed,
A gift unribboned in gold.
Glory, for the broken-hearted,
For the hope-hobbled, dream-starved,
Song-stricken children of earth.
Glory, for the pain-ridden,
Bed-burdened, death-stalked,
Fear-fettered brothers and sisters.
Glory, for the hard-bitten,
Hate-twisted, Wonder-wounded,
Love-stolen sons and daughters.
Glory, this thing
That shines when all is lost,
The one enduring promise,
The thing God holds out to us--
Flings into the December air,
Sprinkles into our dearest dreams,
Offers to us at the cost of
Everything.
This Advent we remember
What we have almost forgotten:
That the Glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
And all flesh—
You, me, everybody—
Shall see it, together.
The mouth of the Lord has spoken.

Carol of the Grass

Sung to 'Est Ist Ein Ros' (Lo, How A Rose E'er Blooming)

The long grass in the meadow
Once green in golden sun
Will fade in winter’s darkness
When summer’s flowers are done:
So all good things must die,
For every season passes,
And years go swiftly by.

God’s love goes on forever
As green as life can be,
His Word always creating
New possibility,
In darkness light shall spring,
A hope beyond our dreaming,
Redeeming everything.

Come quickly now, Lord Jesus,
And be our summer’s Sun,
Fill all our hearts with gladness,
Our true and faithful One,
Come, Dawn, and give rebirth.
Turn hearts to fragrant flower,
Bring glory to your earth.

Advent Calendar

In the countdown to Christmas,
The Advent doors peel open
One by one.
Here we find an orange or candlestick,
And maybe, tomorrow, a singing dove.
Better would be to find—
Behind some numbered door—
An answered prayer
Or Christmas miracle,
Some wholly holy gift:
Peace to heal the world,
Broken chains for all oppressed,
A cure for every dread disease.
What can a painted orange or candle serve?
Perhaps they give us this,
As we wait for greater things:
They teach us to see,
Behind the door of this new day,
Those tiny, hidden, priceless gifts:
A sparrow coming awake at dawn,
The curl of a finger around a pen,
A breath of sweet December air,
The sound of a giggle through a wall,
A song known by heart.
Love is in these things,
Making a place within us
For something—someone—awesome
To be born.

Prepare the Way

Out of season,
A yellow flower blooms
Among the dry leaves.
A crimson fire saturates
The evening sky.
An alien mass
Takes root in the brain
Of a good and faithful friend.
All around us
We seek meaning among the mysteries,
Look for portents, signs
To help us prepare for all that lies ahead
For good or ill:
A change of fortune,
An unexpected blessing or curse,
Or perhaps some awful doom
Beyond our imagining.
Long ago they came
To the fiery Baptist,
Wild and windblown,
As if his flashing eyes discerned
Some path or promise they could grasp.
We, too, seek prophets,
Sift through signs
--Silly, hopeful, mysterious—
To give us sense and sight..
Or maybe only this:
To help us glimpse the sandaled one
Who comes, who comes.

WILDERNESS

I walk through the familiar woods,
Crossing a spine of granite ledge
To the shoulder of a hill.
A hawk circles overhead,
And far below a gray finger of water
Circles out of sight.
I find comfort in this place,
Where no human voice intrudes.
It is the comfort of silence,
Sanctified by a breath of wind
And the smell of earth and rain,
Where time and life are measured
On a clock of sun and stars
And a calendar of seasons.
There is a holy voice here,
And a space to hear the voice
Of my own heart.
Here I can walk into the other wildness,
The brambled hollows of my past,
The overgrown paths littered
With regrets and disappointments,
Sorrows and fears.
This is not a journey I desire,
But it is where I must go
To prepare the way of the Lord.
The hawk cries,
And maybe there is glory
To be discovered this gray day,
A voice of comfort, even joy,
On this Advent morning.

COMING

Advent.
This new year begins
In silence,
No fireworks, no toasts,
No whoop-de-do at all.
It is the silence
That carries us
Into the whispered morning
Of a new day,
A new season.
This time will not be
All of my own making.
It will be formed
By what is coming:
The unexpected meeting,
The bent plans,
The stranger in the path.
The jays in the swamp maple chatter,
Interrupting the quiet of my waking.
They see something ahead
From their treetop perch,
And sing.


--Timothy Haut