A Christmas Sense

S8301797

My dining area.
 

Subject: A Christmas Sense
Date: Fri, 17 Dec 2010 10:25:40 +0000

              Is there plenty of food available? Do we need to walk the length and breadth to celebrate Christmas? Why is Christmas so special, and what is the sense of it? We want Chrismas to be extra-special, happy or happier, to spur us into sentiments that we can look back to. It is another bonus to life, whatever that means. We rush around, not even knowing what to buy, what to plan;  we think about  tinsels gleaming brightly, the cold weather in Europe and other northern parts. We go to  Christmas plays and feasting in nice restaurants,  the dance, the ball, the children romping around in their nice outfits. The drinks and drinking, the beautifully-wrapped presents and opening them with sheer excitement,  the carols and hymns played in shops, homes,  the bearded  fat men in red and white outfits ho-hoing and smiling at children running to them for sweets, and a hug.Risa 
 
            Whatever it is about the beauty of Christmas must be the joy of the celebration itself. Of course we know it is now highly-commercialised, but who cares? Adults and children love Christmas. We all look forward to this season. It is inexplicable to doubt the glorious effect it has on the majority of people around the world. How can we shove Christmas to one side when it is one season where we can share gifts, love and joy? Where we see the glee in children's faces, their wonderment and purity of acceptance. Sonrisa
 
            The emotion felt by kids receiving their Christmas presents is another plus in an otherwise bleak year for many families. All over the world, we see pockets of war, poverty, violence , natural catastrophe. But Christmas also brings a moment of peace and harmony. We can all share in the sadness but at the same time, Christmas can also be an engine of new-found inner peace and understanding. The sense of Christmas is having Christmas each December. We all await this special time of year without the usual guilt we keep in our thoughts.
 
            There is no stopping Christmas. Even in the Islamic world, they celebate Christmas with the Christian world. Christmas brings us all together. It keeps the tills going; it employs people; it puts money in people's pockets; it may bankrupt some, temporarily, but that's just the way it is, in the five continents that love and celebrate Christmas. It gives meaning to an otherwise drab month. Christmas makes sense and it is this that gives us the sense to understand better about us, too.SorpresaSabelotodo

A very very Happy Christmas to you all! May 2011 be just as good or better, happier. Above all, may it be another peaceful, more prosperous and doctor-free, dentist-free year!Sonrisa
 
(unedited version) 

About

A Socio-Political Poem called: "Land Mines">>Silver Medal at the International Society of Poets, Washington, D.C. 2000

(Abridged Version, a requirement at the Competition...The Unabridged Version has twenty two stanzas...)

They crawl, they beg, they lie about in cases,
The peace and quiet and ugly open spaces,
Giving up that hope, giving up a dream,
Their knowledge of life is limited to a scream;

So near, yet far, estranged and no help,
They try to reach out, they can only yelp,
The barking, the mooing, as if there's no more hell,
A donation, a clasp, and nothing more to quell;

That tunnel of hope reminds you and me,
It brings forth truth but nowhere to see,
It brushes the tone of moderation and diplomacy,
While the real victims of land mines recognise no supremacy;

"Spell it out why we need those mines,"
Suppliers survive, factories an endless spine,
The real angst of victims is their own uselessness,
Dutiful Red Cross always ending up to assess;

One, two, three, four, make a million more,
Five, six, seven, eight, add up to the fore,
Nine, ten, eleven, twelve, forget unlucky thirteen,
The nth victim of that mine, lay unconscious, unforeseen.

"Published in the anthology, "The Woodland Echoes", The International Library of Poetry, 1999. Also integrated in a cassette tape along with other nine other best poems, 1999. Voted Editor's Choice Award, 1999. The unabridged version of "Land Mines" has 48 lines.

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