When I Think of Christmas

 

 

When I think of Christmas I think of the King of Love laid in a manger –

Sovereignty supine under sterling stars twinkling through millennia of delight,

Sublimity submitted to the gaze of cherubim and seraphim and slack-jawed shepherds.

 

When I think of Christmas I think of a Son,

A Son, whose tiny hands, emptied of Omnipotence, outstretched from the eternal Embrace,

Nailed to a tree –

A tree of death – bearing my Exclusion!

 

When I think of Christmas I think of swaddling clothes

Later to be exchanged for a seamless robe and then for a torn veil,

And then, for a burial shroud turned inside out.

 

When I think of Christmas I think of no room in the inn

And later finding an upper room so as to lay my head on Him Who breaks His Body,

Who pours out His blood,

Who lays down His life for His friends.

 

When I think of Christmas I think,

Friends walking in Embrace:

“Do not our hearts burn within us, from that first day until now,

Whenever Christmas comes to our house?”

 

 

© Sally Paradise, 2011, All Rights Reserved

UltraSound

UltraSound

  

Look! Joseph!  Look!

Space and time converge

In my belly!

_

Test.

Submission:

_

The Three-in-One now resides

Etched within a black and white sonogram:

A baby (no storm in a tea cup!)!

See the heart beating? The limbs akimbo?

“Put your hand on my side, Thomas.”

Can you feel the sound waves of My Being: Your God and My God immersed in time?

Yes! I feel it!

A kick!

A belly full of kenosis!

Fetal tissue,

Hanging on limbs –

The weight of glory descending down –

Soon will suffer evil

To save hoary Adam,

Banishing the body’s self-absorption called Death

From the garden and

For all.

(A womb may hold Him;  A tomb can not.)

****

© Sally Paradise, 2010, All Rights Reserved

O Holy Flight (From Christmas)

(A postmodern Christmas)

Christmas Eve:

Over the waiting and through the body scanner,

To grandmother’s house we go…

The TSA knows the way,

To handle …your package.

“Underwear bombers move to the end of the line, please!”

  ***

Yuletide carols being sung by a secular choir;

Female pop singers whining down another year,

Music streaming, reprogramming.

***

Broke, Flat-out busted, Best Buy-ed,

Macy, Macyier, Macyest,

Amassed among the Amazon-ed.

***

Fizz the season, too, by golly:

“Plop, Plop. Fizz. Fizz.

O, what a relief it is!”

 ***

Sprigs of Hollywood and Vine dance while

Visions of HD sugar plums fairies

Tug remotely at

Lazy Boys

Churning.

***

Egg nog, glug and figgy pudding?

G-G-Ghosts of Christmas gastronomy.

***

Superstore angels bring good tidings of great joy:

Black Friday is the new White Christmas!

***

Down the chimney,

“Ho, Ho, Ho,”

Global Warming comes,

Inconveniently,

Melting away minutes of our snow covered evening.

Bah, Humbug you opportunistic

Scrooge of a scourge.

“I’ll cap and trade your ass!”

***  

Up on the housetop reindeer pause…

Carbon footprints in the snow! Oh, no!

Update:  Reindeer games beginning 10:00 EST.

***

Santa, “APPROVED”,

Baby Jesus, ACLU’d.

Nativity Receptivity?

It takes a village to raze a Christ Child.

*****
Marquee lights announce the second coming of Black Friday.

Electrified houses boast of more watts per square inch.

Tree lights twinkle when tickled by boughs

Glowing snowmen bobbing, bobbing slow men glowing

White blinking lights, sentinels flanking our windows,

Warn us of Christmas!

****

© Sally Paradise, 2010, All Rights Reserved