Yuletide Poem by Patrick Dennis

'And there were in the same country shepherds watching and keeping the night watch over their flock.' (Luke 2: 8

On the icy dark, the ghostly shape of shepherds:
and the sheep like clumps of rock on the sea's shore
licked smooth and low by countless blows of lashing tides
huddle together against the cold.
Up above, no cloud marks the sky
and the stars like a billion billion lucent gems
adorn the strange splendour of the winter night.

How could those ancient men know the awesome stirrings of the power of God
broken to them in far off tiny points of light?
In the dingy comfort of the cave did they see
in the rapt stillness of the scene, in the aspect of the newborn infant
and the awestruck bearing of the man and the woman
that the God of this night's tidings lay sleeping in that infant form?

Perhaps the lonely countless silent vigils,
small sheep-life, harsh rage of elements,
beauty of sunrise, glamour and terror of night storms,
noontide heat and the blast of desert sand against the eyes
prepared them for this;
and second sight alive and strong
gave them to see beyond our human sight,
ears to hear the angelic tidings and faith to enter and adore
the Mighty Power of the stars now become a woman's child.