December 25: God's Presence, Pleasant Exhaustion, Christmas Poem, "Bigfoot Noel"

It was on Fifty-third and Fifth that Ives saw an old woman struggling down a stairway to a subway station, and he stopped to help her along.  He was whistling and seemed so cheerful that the old woman said, "My, you really do enjoy this holiday, don't you?" and Ives said, "Yes, I do, very much, but you see, ma'am, it's just not this time of the year; you see, ma'am, I've just had the most unusual kind of experience, though it's not anything I can really explain, except to say that about half an hour ago I had a vision of God's presence in the world.  And it still makes me feel joy."  Then:  "Well, good luck to you, ma'am.  And Merry Christmas."

I know that I've talked about Ives' mystical vision before, but, on this Christmas day, I think focusing on an image of God's goodness in the world is appropriate.  In Ives' vision, everyone and everything shimmers with peace and love and understanding.  It's an experience that sticks with Ives for the rest of his life.

Last night, after the 11 p.m. candlelight church service, I came home and sat on the couch, watching the 24-hour marathon of A Christmas Story on TBS.  Our kids were in bed.  The Christmas wrapping was done.  Christmas had arrived, and I felt a kind of pleasant exhaustion creep over me.  The holiday race was over.  Ready or not, Jesus had arrived.

I wish all of my disciples a wonderful and blessed Christmas, full of love and warmth and friendship.  If you are alone this holiday, know that I have said a prayer for you this day.  If you are struggling with your health or finances, know that God is with you.  If you are simply a Scrooge, going out of your way to make other people miserable, know that your figgy pudding will soon curdle and your holly berries will fall off.

Below is my Christmas poem for this year.  It's a little weird.  One friend called it "Azimov-ian."  I took it as a compliment.

Saint Marty is ready for a long winter's nap this evening, maybe with the help of a little Christmas cheer.

Bigfoot Noel

for everyone we love, Christmas 2015

He slouches through this night,

an eclipse of hair and muscle and foot,

guided by some wild nova

in the chambers of his Neanderthal

chest.  It’s an ancient story,

Precambrian even, about ice,

juniper berry in the deadest of winter.

Digging through dermal frost

to root and worm.  Mushroom

caps in frozen moss, strips

of pine gnawed into sweet paste.

And moon held in knuckles of sumac.

Yes, it’s about need and hunger,

a bottomless lake carved by glacier.

It’s wilderness, the blind

sound of nebulae exploding seventy

million miles a day.  Ice Age.  Meteor

rain.  Seraphim screaming hosannas

over panicked rams.  Starlight and manure.

The coming of Something

ferocious, untamable.

He knows all this somehow,

the way he knows where salmon leap, spawn.

He stands at the edge of a clearing,

stares up, into the hills, toward

an empty cave.  He tilts back

his head, opens his throat, sings a song

for the evolution of love.