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New Day Herald

Christmas Eve Day

 

a poem by Joseph Millar

Thin solstice daylight settles its traces
on the cypress out by the dunes.
It gathers like rain on the cornices
of the library and the jail
and the small theater next to the park.

All night the deep swell has been rocking
under the piers, as though held
by the gaze of the moon
while we slept in the dark, holding on
to each other and dreaming of ships and horses.

And on Christmas Eve Day in the shopping center
poincettia plants cover the sidewalk
outside the big hardware store.
They light up the morning and the bright
red sleeves of the Salvation Army woman
ringing her bell
under the sign that says
“You Make the Difference”.

There’s no one like any of us
yet we’re the same
feeding our sheep on the hillsides
or traveling west in the Magi’s train,
making straight the way for the Lord
and for the first water to break and fall
through the birth-light blossoming
in the landscapes of Advent
and the great Sound blessing us all.

– Joseph Millar

4 thoughts on “Christmas Eve Day”

  1. Thank you, Joseph Millar, for “the landscapes of Advent”.
    As a fellow poet of MSIÅ, I appreciate your words and the Sound of your heart.

    Mary Lou Jacoby (age 91, LA, California)

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