Silent Night. The Whole World Holds Its Breath

Music: Sicut lilium inter spinas.
By Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina.
Performed by The Tudor Consort at the Free Music Archive
under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license.

Silent night. The whole world holds its breath.
Each faith has its own seasonal salvation,
As myth becomes the antidote for death,
Sorrow turned to cause for celebration.
Of those who have no faith but just look on,
None need believe to join the pageantry,
Singing with a joy that's not put on,
Glad for holiness that one can see.
Reason ought not scoff at myth, but find
Enduring beauty in the fictive frame,
Embracing subtleties of heart and mind
That else a soul would be hard put to name.
In faith one sees the power and grace of art
Not on a wall but seated in the heart,
Grace honed well by centuries of prayer,
Salvation one might savor if not share.

[about this site]

[poems for free]