• When death must come at Christmastime,
    There is a special grief,
    A mourning that must mix with joy,
    A pain that must be brief.

    There is an anguish underneath
    The labyrinth of light
    That longs for simple emptiness
    To contemplate the night.

    But life must bubble on its way
    And pleasure be put on,
    For neither sorrow nor delight
    Is ever left alone.

    And, like the Virgin, we must smile
    With enigmatic grace
    As we receive the fragile gift
    That nothing can replace.
    emo