The year, whose hopes were high and strong, Has now no hopes to wake; Yet one hour more of jest and song For his familiar sake.

I heard the bells on Christmas Day Their old, familiar carols play And wild and sweet the words repeat Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

It is the festival of lights, I have no candles. I light one for each night, pray on a row of nine lighthouses.

The world tonight is clear, If only for an hour Orion’s belt encircling us, The far indigo ocean Thundering near And I remember Rain the alley No shortcut home.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, Are heading home again. Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, The world offers itself to your imagination.

We lie on the cold sand and it embraces us, this beach where locals never go in summer and boast of their absence.

With incense sweet our thanks ascend; Before thy works our powers pall; Though we should strive years without end, We could not thank thee for them all.

The water sings along our keel, The wind falls to a whispering breath; I look into your eyes and feel No fear of life or death; So near is love, so far away The losing strife of yesterday.

With night coming early, And dawn coming late, And ice in the bucket And frost by the gate. The fires burn And the kettles sing, And earth sinks to rest Until next spring.

I saw Lon Chaney Jr. walking with the Queen, Doin’ the werewolves of London I saw a werewolf drinkin’ a piña colada at Trader Vic’s And his hair was perfect.

Again the wind Flakes gold-leaf from the trees And the painting darkens — As if a thousand penitents Kissed an icon Till it thinned.

That a great blue heron Should sail over my house each evening And circle the wet fire of the marsh, Concentrically spiralling down, Is near to holiness for me.

The fields lie wrapt in autumn dreams, Beneath the dim, blue vault of night, The moon, like a bark on sluggish streams, Spreads soft her sail of silver light.

The day is yet one more yellow leaf And without turning I kiss the light By an old well on the last of the month Gathering wild rose hips In the sun.

Full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft; And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

A boy and his dad on a fishing trip — There is a glorious fellowship! Father and son and the open sky, And the white clouds lazily drifting by.

The breezes taste Of apple peel. The air is full Of smells to feel — Ripe fruit, old footballs, Burning brush, New books, erasers, Chalk, and such.

The grasshopper’s horn, and far-off, high in the maples, The wheel of a locust leisurely grinding the silence Under a moon waning and worn, broken, Tired with summer.

A languid atmosphere, a lazy breeze, With labored respiration, moves the wheat From distant reaches, till the golden seas Break in crisp whispers at my feet.

Why all the embarrassment About being happy? Sometimes I’m as happy As a sleeping dog, And for the same reasons, And for others.