The Dawn of the Tiny King
By Il Fratello
What should I do with all this Christmas news
that dawns like fire-light on ice
that makes a change and says to change–
will I allow the pitiful child, born in a cattle pen
to steal upon the near-hardened strings of my callous heart?
let my eyes see what I at first don’t see
strain my deafened ears to listen once again
for small tender, deep down things?
or casually sleep the night, assuming it to be
like any other night. and say upon accounting
I never saw or heard or knew he came?
low, low, low, low down things
manure and straw, dirt floor and the cold draft
of winter ice-wind through barn boards
who will keep warm the infant savior of the world?
I even I, who most needs saving, can give my cloak
stand watch outside the door,
lean against the drafty wall and block the cold
get mary water, run for joseph’s gentle requests
in the balance of the night I will choose
to scoff or to love
to turn away or to help
to pass by or to stop
and let my heart be struck-smitten-cracked
open by the incarnation of Love
what wild song the angels sing
dancing on the breezes of the midnight star-sky
that calls to us a sweeter sound like
love-struck joy, like earth heaving
mountain ache of now rightly-set things.
They sing salvation come to us in darkest hour
a tiny King, his dawn is fire-light.
