Nativity at Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, Suva
Dorking friend Sally kindly sent me Wendy Cope's 'A Christmas Song'. Wendy's work is all over the web and quite a lot can be accessed here at the Poetry Archive. You can also download her reading this poem for a small fee. It goes like this:
A CHRISTMAS SONG
Why is the baby crying
On this, his special day,
When we have brought him lovely gifts
And laid them on the hay?
He’s crying for the people
Who greet this day with dread
Because somebody dear to them
Is far away or dead,
For all the men and women
Whose love affairs went wrong,
Who try their best at merriment
When Christmas comes along,
For separated parents
Whose turn it is to grieve
While children hang their stockings up
Elsewhere on Christmas Eve,
For everyone whose burden
Carried through the year
Is heavier at Christmastime,
The season of good cheer.
That’s why the baby’s crying
There in the cattle stall:
He’s crying for those people.
He’s crying for them all.
Wendy Cope
With respect to the author, it prompted this alternative from my own heart and pen. See what you think.
A DIFFERENT CHRISTMAS SONG
Why is the baby giggling
On this, his special day?
He’s tickled by the glittering gifts
And really wants to play.
He’s chuckling with the people
Who swim against the tide,
Who muster strength in agony,
Who’ve had the roughest ride.
He’s laughing in defiance
With those who should feel flat
Because the world expects it;
He’s having none of that.
He’s smiling: an infectious grin,
They can’t help grinning too,
The ones around the Christmas crib,
The ones like me and you.
He’s gurgling and squealing,
It’s spoiling ‘Silent Night’,
He’s rudely blowing raspberries
And darkness floods with light.
He’s had a tough and basic birth
And death will seem defeat,
God knows why evil nails will pierce
In time those chubby feet.
But that’s why baby’s giggling,
The secret’s in the hay;
They may or may not get it,
On Resurrection Day.
Val Ogden
23 December 2017
Nativity at House 12
1.30pm Christmas Eve and counting in Fiji.
With love across the time zones.