Leaves Falling
A man may love a woman, and a woman love a man,
so take my hand in yours, though we have no path or plan,
that we may dance in springtime when the flowers bloom in cheer,
and pirouette, with spinning to defy the turning year.
Then after comes a summer, when we wear a splendid crown,
and then we weep in autumn when the leaves are falling down.
A love may be as pure as sky and burn with blazing light,
undoing every darkness and making day from night,
but we ourselves, like water, through our fingers slip away;
can love be everlasting when we have no strength to stay?
Beginnings come to endings for all things we love and know;
we weep while leaves are falling, then after, only snow.
So take my hand in dancing, for the time will swiftly run,
but we may love together for a while in hope and sun;
perhaps it will give smiles that endure to our recall,
yea, even as our tears well up as leaves begin to fall.
Cloud of Unknowing
A very vasty shadow,
unknowing like to wings,
is spread across the heavens
within which star-suns sing.
All shadows in that shadow
are sleeping, rich with peace;
though they are waxing, waning,
it stays and does not cease.
The night is but a duskling;
though midnight is its hue,
its blackness not the blackness
of the dark beyond all view.
For in that darkness shadows
are blazing like to flame
and all that we think darkness
is darkness but in name.
The horror that you suffer,
the thing you do not know,
against that nightmost darkness
is but a glow-worm's glow.
We feel our way like blind men;
in shade we trip and fall;
but in darkness in its glory
we scarce can move at all,
so when it falls upon us,
we cannot do but kneel
and pray there as we waver
before the darkness real.
Christmas
The stars in the quiet
shine softly above
as wind in its silence
is whispering of love.
The world in its sorrow
may weep for the day,
but high in the heaven
the angels all say:
Fear not, fear not,
but bow down to pray,
and know him, and love him,
the babe born today.
The sins of the nations
rise high to the sky;
the heathen are raging
with violence and lie;
but look to your Savior,
who shows you the way,
and meet your salvation
as shepherds now say:
Fear not, fear not,
but bow down to pray,
and know him, and love him,
this bright Christmas Day.