ASLaN

St. Nicholas Literary Page

Christmas Poetry

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
(or)
Welcome to the Night of the Living Dead

By Sinker Knicker

Hers was the sacred and blessed young womb
from where the first of five had bloomed,
and ours was the sailing of holiday ships
that came to rest in the docking of hips.
And even though death has done us part,
and making this love is a very lost art,
I still hear the songs she sang this night,
when we were rejoicing and praising the Light.
But now another man sleeps in her bed—
welcome to the night of the living dead.

And here at the dawn of this silent night
I think of the love that I lost, and her light,
and madrigals praising her sparkle and mirth
and the joy once shared on a planet called Earth.
Tonight in this blizzard I'm lost in the snow
of memories of babies, and watching them grow,
and watching their hearts that were broken like ice
when hit with the hammer and cut with the knife
that severed the vows that we sang as we wed—
welcome to the night of the living dead.

This long, dark solstice that hides in my soul,
my sun turned away, my heat in the cold,
has lurked in my orbit, where I sit alone;
And there is no place, no place like home.
My ruby-red slippers – I click, then I wait—
for a sign of her coming, a sign of her face…
Then gaze at the stars in the vastness of space
And turn from this doorway of no such place.
The oven is empty, and there is no bread—
 welcome to the night of the living dead.

"Through the years, we all will be together…"
the melody stings like the whip of this weather,
and here in the glow of this Christmastide moon
dark shadows have flooded a Bethlehem room.
Yours is the face I can scarcely remember
I saw in the eyes of my girl this December,
and there in her smile lives only the ghost
of a girl that I cherished and loved the most.
It's a vision of beauty that now my soul dreads—
O welcome to the night of the living dead.

Outside is dead silence, the deadliest sound,
and snow is destroying my tracks on the ground.
It's true that my true love's a red, red rose,
but ours is a garden where nothingness grows;
and though I rejoice in the sprouting of seeds,
I mourn for a garden that's gone to the weeds.
And the wind is a-wailing this wintery night,
while the moon is reflecting and mocking with light
that's waning away where before she had led—
welcome to the night of the living dead.