Christmas Day

             AMONG US

Pushed from heaven, they say,
But, still from a mother's womb,
A warm dark comfortable place.
From warm womb to cold world,
A world as hard and cold as nails,
He came to live among us.

Before breath, the catch of hands,
Made rough by fresh cut wood,
Unsanded wood, full of splinters.
Unforgiving wood against flesh,
Flesh that reached out to take,
The One who came to live among us.

Shook to breathe, and live
And smell the new smells of earth,
Dung, and dirt, and moldy hay,
And taste the sweat of a father's hand,
The milk of a mother's breast.
The Holy Child, flesh among us.