EVERY CHILD

A Poem for the Lord and a Hymn in Commemoration of
The Hope of Christmas

Not every child the Magi keep
Not every child with shepherds sleep
Not every child with beast does play
Not every child along the way
Has angels watching night and day
Yet he came to make a world
Like this

Not every child by favor blessed
Not every child has such bequest
Not every child with gifts bestowed
Not every child is fated so
Not every child his father knows
Not every child with Heavens Wealth
Comes to this world with Heaven’s help
Yet he came to make a world
Thus so

Not every child their birth foretold
Not every child is crowned with gold
Not every child in utmost peace
Not every child their hope unleashed
Not every child does bloom within
Not every child at birth begins
To blossom with a Holy Grace
Adored of nature, flesh, and face
Yet he came to make a world
That is

For…

Every child should one day wake
The Christmas of the Lord their fate
The Noel of his life their own
Their birth his birth, his heart their home
Their Father’s keeping, love and care
His Son their brother, and their share
For on that Christmas morn they be
The Child of God, and just like he…

__________________________________________________________

A couple of days ago my wife insisted I take some time off. So I did, at least
from my normal schedule and my novel writing and scientific and mathematical
work, and from running around for Christmas.

But disliking sloth I spent the morning hiking and practicing playing the guitar.

After that I set myself the task of writing some songs. So by the end of the day I had written four songs (or at least the lyrics for each song, I only have the music sketched out for one) and this poem, which I intend to transform into a hymn.

I had not really set out to write a hymn on that day, and that wasn’t my original
intent as I went to work on this piece. But I was only a few lines in when I realized
what it was and what it was becoming. Once I realized what it was I just went fully
and easily in that direction.

I am pleased with the result.

So I publicly submit this poem (still to become a hymn) as my work in honor of Jesus on this Christmas, the year of our Lord, 2018 AD.

I hope you enjoy it, and Have a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy and Very
Prosperous New Year.

God Bless you and your Family and Friends.

Jack.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

and God Richly Bless You all My Friends

IF CHRIST PREVAILED (Merry Christmas)

IF CHRIST PREVAILED

(My Wyrdwend Christmas Card, 2014)

If Christ prevailed men would not cower
If Christ prevailed God’s Holy Tower would
Stand a rampart in this world that none could
Raze nor hope to break, nor should
His Kingdom ever quake for fear of being over-run

If Christ prevailed men would fear not Death
If Christ prevailed men would not fear to truly Live
If Christ prevailed there would be no tribes
At endless war, no pointless hate consuming every shore
With riot, hatred, fire, and fury circumscribed

If Christ prevailed “Repent!” on every tongue and wrong
Would be avoided, not relived eternal in profitless cycles
Of sorrowful sin, evils would be un-grown and long buried
Not watered with grasping human grievance, a song of
Festering harm sung to our children like Grimmaged fairy tales

If Christ prevailed all men would as brothers walk long
Beside another, traveling from place to place in happy peace
While laughing of marvelous discoveries made and deeds
Redeemed in better fortune than they had first imagined
When humbly in their abandoned pride they were again Reborn

If Christ prevailed then Justice would rule this Earth
Not vengeance, not crucifying and murderous retribution,
If Christ prevailed then innocents would not lie dead
In pools of blood or lay breathless and abandoned
In favor of our own prideful assumptions about the Truth

If Christ prevailed all men with Mercy would extend themselves
To rework wrong into a better thing, a home fit for
Good and Godly conduct, Law would be Great and not merely law
No man would flee responsibility, Duty would reign, and
Sacrifice would paint and decorate our halls with Holy Acts

If Christ prevailed we would need no government of man
For God would live within, and Man Himself, once so ennobled
Could neither bow nor sit for any other king, and all
Other governance would seem a dream of despair long deserted
In the desperate nightmare of an unreal and wasted world

If Christ prevailed then such a Kingdom as the world has never
Known would be everywhere apparent, its Frontiers swollen
With ceaseless growth, no enemy would want to stand against it,
Old foes would be absorbed and made equals, no Jew, no Greek,
No Gentile would be alien or stranger in that Better Land

If Christ prevailed all men would be equals, anxious
To outdo the other in holiness and good, competitive in our
Desires to be more like God, not less of honor and of grace,
Our Feats would be of Saintly Salt, Virtues would accrue, and
Our Peeraged Manhood we would hold a Holy Thing from God

But Christ does not prevail

For we are sorely and surely most ourselves, self-absorbed,
Split into endless, bickering tribes, minted into our
Mindless classes, divided in our sickened hearts, soulless
In our lack of faith, impotent in our works, spiritless and
Dead within ourselves – we guard nothing, build nothing,
Claim nothing, oppose nothing, promote nothing, become nothing

For deep inside we are afraid, and we are small and we are
No men to build Mighty Kingdoms of, and so

Christ does not prevail, for we are cowards all by choice,

and so instead we prevail unto our doom.

MERRY CHRISTMAS ONE AND ALL

MAY YOU HAVE THE WORLD YOU MOST DESIRE…

THE YEAR OF OUR LORD, 2014