! Solstice Poem by Michael Shepherd

! Solstice

Rating: 3.5


This year,21 December is the crucial day:
Earth, Sun, in their ancient dance.

Do they need our help?
The day, here in the North, shrinking;
what should be, if any, our concern?

Offer up our Christmas gifts
to beg exchange for longer days?

Hold vigil at Stonehenge,
believing that all our being,
all our attention, is what we owe,
to earn a daylight that
may not continue on the morrow
to shrink to eternal darkness?

Feel so small, as we contemplate
The mysteries of the universe?

Feel so great, as we participate
in so vast a system?

Or just, a private moment’s awe,
then back to Christmas obligations?

How quick we’ll be, though,
to note the day’s few bonus minutes
in a week or two – post-Christmas gift
that was delayed in some almighty post;
secretly, we’re sure that we deserve it;

yet, a lifting of the heart, while we forget
December’s heaviness.
I have not mentioned love.

COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Tom J. Mariani 13 December 2007

'Feel so small.../ Feel so great as we paticipate' You mention several ways one can participate in the ancient dance. In our modern life we have moved a way from nature unless she does somthing spectacular: like a major ice-storm in our Mid-west. Solstice quietly sneeks up on us. On day in Jan or Feb we notice we have more daylight. Unless the government issues an order to spring forwad or fall back, urban USA takes little notice. Thanks for the reminder. Tom

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Michael Shepherd

Michael Shepherd

Marton, Lancashire
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