Skip to main content

A Season of Visions

And in this season
we call Christmas and Holidays,
Kwanzaa and Hanukkah, Germany’s
Saint Nicholas’ Day, and the Philippines’

Giant Lantern Festival, Columbia’s
Day of Little Candles, and Toronto’s
Cavalcade of Lights, France’s
Joyeux Noël, and Russia’s Grandfather Frost,

let us find unity, cooperation, friendship.
Let us revel in the pretty lights and the decorated trees,
the wintry days and the cozy nights,
the happy faces and the party fun.

Let us feel the grief of the losses of others,
the struggling families in an unbalanced
economy, the addicted caught in some
endless torment, the shamed haunted by

a long-ago abuse, the ill unable to enter
into the many festivities, the lonely shut off
from the busy happy crowds, the prisoners
locked in their regrets and dishonor, the

mentally infirm whose minds no longer work
and whose memories have lost their power.
It is a season of birth, of lights, of glory.
It is a time to remember the dead, to honor

the living, to celebrate, to be generous; a time
to embrace one another, to hug someone warmly,
to smile into the eyes of children; a time to look
beyond the many cruelties and the abasement of people.

A time to see the vision of Jesus fulfilled in our hearts,
not of righteous elites but humbled humans
blundering along, seeking a Star to guide us, exploring
the enduring and inexpressible mystery of love.


© 2017 Timothy Moody

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

If I had five minutes to evacuate--what would I take with me?

If I was told there was a bomb in my building and I had five minutes to evacuate my apartment I’d grab a grocery bag and quickly toss these items into it: 1. A photo of my grandparents, Mom and Pop and me, when I was 15 years old. I learned what love is made of from them. I learned what it is to be kissed on and hugged in arms so tender they felt like God’s arms. I discovered self worth from those two angels in human flesh. Of all the people in my life, they were the ones who made me feel I counted. Honestly, whatever capacity I have to love others came from them. 2. A sentimental, dog-eared, stars in the margin copy of Pat Conroy’s, “The Prince of Tides.” It is a book I have read three times and often return to for its wisdom. It is a harsh, profoundly tragic novel, the story of a family so broken and tortured by such flawed and wounded people that it is sometimes difficult to turn the next page. And yet it is the story of such Herculean courage and endurance that you want...
9 comments
Read more

I Saw the Delicacy of Life

I was flying Across the deep And I saw the delicacy Of life Wrinkles on the faces Of the old So pure they glistened Like awards The joy of children Running with abandon Their laughter ringing Like chimes in the wind I saw the soft moving waves Across the sea And the trees releasing Their rainbow leaves Birds joined me on my flight And I saw the surface of their wings Adorned with patterns Glorious and unfurled I saw the tears of the sad And the smiles of the glad The suffering in mourning And the celebration of birth As I descended toward the ground Slowly, slowly, softly I saw the gentle grass of the field And smelled the fresh earth It was a perfect landing © 2018 Timothy Moody
Post a Comment
Read more

A Losing Strategy

OPINION PAGE (c) 2024 Timothy Moody   The Republican strategy to mock and judge others has passed into some form of insatiable, all-devouring nastiness. It is so poisonous and contemptuous that it is now just evil.  Republican Governor of Arkansas, Sara Huckabee Sanders, suggested to a crowd of Trump supporters Tuesday night that Kamala Harris can't be humble because she doesn't have any children of her own.  When will Americans decide they don't want government leaders who are so arrogantly insensitive, as Sanders was, that they offend everyone?  This crude, villainous rhetoric transcends political partisanship. It’s evil, dangerous, and insulting.  The poet Ezra Pound’s brief lines are appropriate here, “Pull down your vanity, How mean your hates” To suggest that someone cannot be humble because they don't have children is not just a cheap political comment. It's an attack on a person’s humanity and worth.  And that is now, and has been fo...
Post a Comment
Read more