“May the Father of all mercies scatter light, and not darkness, upon our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in His own due time and way, everlastingly happy.” – George Washington, Letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, 1790
‘Tis an old message, readers, but it still rings true. Have a Happy Christmas Eve and a Merry Christmas!
“God rest ye, merry gentlemen
Let nothing you dismay….”
The Mithril Guardian
Song to Our Mother
(Tonantzin Icuic)
At the foot of the hill
Where the roses bloomed
I contemplate the Virgin
Who captured my heart.
–
Mother mine of Guadalupe
Mother mine, all love,
We beg thee to give us
Thy benediction and peace.
–
No other nation on earth
Has been so blessed by God
For that the Indians of Mexico
Carry thee in their hearts.
–
Guadalupe, Guadalupe,
The name that brings us joy,
May it be ever on our lips
With great devotion.
–
Mayest thou be praised in heaven
Sweet Virgin Mother of God
And on earth beloved
From end to end of our land.
–
On Tepeyac she appeared
Like a divine Star
She is there to be our light
To protect and guide us.
–
Glory to the Immortal Princess
Who freed us from great evil
And to make us happy
She crushed the serpent.
–
Guadalupe, Guadalupe,
The name that brings us solace
–
It’s the name of my mother,
Of my mother and of God’s.
A sword of silver cuts the fields asunder—
A silver sword to-night, a lake in June—
And plains of snow reflect, the maples under,
The silver arrows of a wintry moon.
The trees are white with moonlight and with ice-pearls;
The trees are white, like ghosts we see in dreams;
The air is still: there are no moaning wind-whirls;
And one sees silence in the quivering beams.
December night, December night, how warming
Is all thy coldness to the Christian soul:
Thy very peace at each true heart is storming
In potent waves of love that surging roll.
December night, December night, how glowing
Thy frozen rains upon our warm hearts lie:
Our God upon this vigil is bestowing
A thousand graces from the silver sky.
O moon, O symbol of our Lady’s whiteness;
O snow, O symbol of our Lady’s heart;
O night, chaste night, bejewelled with argent brightness,
How sweet, how bright, how loving, kind thou art.
O miracle: to-morrow and to-morrow,
In tender reverence shall no praise abate;
For from all seasons shall we new jewels borrow
To deck the Mother born Immaculate.
Carrion Comfort
BY Gerard Manley Hopkins
Not, I’ll not, carrion comfort, Despair, not feast on thee;
Not untwist — slack they may be — these last strands of man
In me ór, most weary, cry I can no more. I can;
Can something, hope, wish day come, not choose not to be.
But ah, but O thou terrible, why wouldst thou rude on me
Thy wring-world right foot rock?lay a lionlimb against me? scan
With darksome devouring eyes my bruisèd bones? and fan,
O in turns of tempest, me heaped there; me frantic to avoid thee and flee?
–
Why? That my chaff might fly; my grain lie, sheer and clear.
Nay in all that toil, that coil, since (seems) I kissed the rod,
Hand rather, my heart lo! lapped strength, stole joy, would laugh, chéer.
Cheer whom though? the hero whose heaven-handling flung me, foot tród
Me? or me that fought him? O which one? is it each one? That night, that year
Of now done darkness I wretch lay wrestling with (my God!) my God.
Happy Old Christmas Day!!!
NATIVITY
Immensity, cloister’d in thy dear womb,
Now leaves His well-beloved imprisonment.
There he hath made himself to his intent
Weak enough, now into our world to come.
But O! for thee, for Him, hath th’ inn no room?
Yet lay Him in this stall, and from th’ orient,
Stars, and wise men will travel to prevent
The effects of Herod’s jealous general doom.
See’st thou, my soul, with thy faith’s eye, how He
Which fills all place, yet none holds Him, doth lie?
Was not His pity towards thee wondrous high,
That would have need to be pitied by thee?
Kiss Him, and with Him into Egypt go,
With His kind mother, who partakes thy woe.
“May the Father of all mercies scatter light, and not darkness, upon our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in His own due time and way, everlastingly happy.” – George Washington, Letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, 1790
Song to Our Mother
(Tonantzin Icuic)
At the foot of the hill
Where the roses bloomed
I contemplate the Virgin
Who captured my heart.
–
Mother mine of Guadalupe
Mother mine, all love,
We beg thee to give us
Thy benediction and peace.
–
No other nation on earth
Has been so blessed by God
For that the Indians of Mexico
Carry thee in their hearts.
–
Guadalupe, Guadalupe,
The name that brings us joy,
May it be ever on our lips
With great devotion.
–
Mayest thou be praised in heaven
Sweet Virgin Mother of God
And on earth beloved
From end to end of our land.
–
On Tepeyac she appeared
Like a divine Star
She is there to be our light
To protect and guide us.
–
Glory to the Immortal Princess
Who freed us from great evil
And to make us happy
She crushed the serpent.
–
Guadalupe, Guadalupe,
The name that brings us solace
–
It’s the name of my mother,
Of my mother and of God’s.
by Anne B. Quinn
An Indian’s brown cheek curved to a dusky rose,
Once long ago upon Tepeyac’s barren hill
When winter roses bloomed
And roses were mere roses in the glowing laughter
of the lady’s smile.
‘My little son. I love you.’ So all Tepeyac’s holy hill
Now sang an Indian lullaby of roses and wild birds.
A sword of silver cuts the fields asunder—
A silver sword to-night, a lake in June—
And plains of snow reflect, the maples under,
The silver arrows of a wintry moon.
The trees are white with moonlight and with ice-pearls;
The trees are white, like ghosts we see in dreams;
The air is still: there are no moaning wind-whirls;
And one sees silence in the quivering beams.
December night, December night, how warming
Is all thy coldness to the Christian soul:
Thy very peace at each true heart is storming
In potent waves of love that surging roll.
December night, December night, how glowing
Thy frozen rains upon our warm hearts lie:
Our God upon this vigil is bestowing
A thousand graces from the silver sky.
O moon, O symbol of our Lady’s whiteness;
O snow, O symbol of our Lady’s heart;
O night, chaste night, bejewelled with argent brightness,
How sweet, how bright, how loving, kind thou art.
O miracle: to-morrow and to-morrow,
In tender reverence shall no praise abate;
For from all seasons shall we new jewels borrow
To deck the Mother born Immaculate.
Thoughts on the Edge of Forever 