Poem for Christmastide 2012/3

I am working on the basis that we are sufficiently away from the enforced jollities now (Christmas has come even according to the old calendars) and a more reflective tone, even a sad one, can be heard, can be hear-able. 

In a Manger, Away

Oh no, tell me it isn’t,

tell me it isn’t that time again -

that time again when we tell ourselves we are warm and

so much more than warm, for we are ‘mulled’ or

(what is it this time?) ‘glittering’, ‘good-willed’.

For we are not.

Oh no, tell me it isn’t that time again,

that again time for the images (with those of snowy snows)

of that mother and this child,

as if it made sense (now) to say that tender, tender

tenderness is the heart of things’ own heart.

For it is not.

Oh no, tell me not to cheer.

I, who got things wrong (true), have been bruised,

blue-beaten by the un-welcome of others and worse.

I am one for whom there is no room. Of course

it is in this (if in this alone) that I am not alone.

For it is so.