66

Christmas

If the archetypal passions, hypostasized

as gods, are all we worship, and if man

dares glimpse himself now in his gods, his prized

and numenous beliefs are where began

the quest to know and stand free, not its end.

Only a sniveling mind would leap to curse

the gods (greeted once calmly, friend to friend)

in dread our own wills starred the universe.

And it may be so…. Sometimes I have walked

those marveled lanes, vibrant with curious light,

instinct with change, as the first Adam talked

with God freely, before first growth brought night.

I do not urge it. But those wise men styled

Bethlehem’s star to be a human child.