This is a hymn to the longest night,
To darkness that decimates the light,
Long hours we question, wonder and stew:
What crouches beyond in next year’s new? 
Forget the calendar and January one.
Heed the sky, the revel’s begun.
Winter as solstice, an astronomical fact
Ancients marked so the sun came back,
It’s your antidote to the holiday blues
That wafts from your consumer shoes.
You may not know why you carry
A tree inside the house, or view fat
Men in red not so jolly as you grouse.
Step inside the mysteries of evergreen
Understand the fate of the Holly King.
We only give gifts to level our stations,
The rich removed from their machinations.
Reindeer are sacred in the northern lands
The shaman took flight as we all held hands
It was cold in the dark that wrapped our fire
We huddled and put animosities on the pyre
This amulet I made you, it says we are one
I will stand by you when dawn hoists the sun
Delicate and human, our kind made it through
Birthed by darkness to spark and renew.
And because I have stayed up all night
When younger, when I had the might,
Journeyed at daybreak to barren shore
As if it was possible to feel any more
Watched young men plunge into the ice
While women stood then dried them twice
Baptism by lake water, body met soul
A chance in the wild to make ourselves whole
And ready for breakfast, warm in the mouth
As all became solitary, then headed due south,
Each year I find solstice forestalls the gloom
That makes of Yule a magic passing too soon
When habit decided the rays were too bright
From hope and fear braided on this longest night.
Sue Westwind December 21, 2022
Night sky and trees Photo by David Deshaies on Unsplash
Woman before trees Photo by Hernan Sanchez on Unsplash
Heart ice hole Photo by Mika on Unsplash
Two hands and sun Photo by Ricardo Moura on Unsplash
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