Alice Meynell

Christmas Night

 "IF I CANNOT SEE THEE PRESENT I WILL MOURN
  THEE ABSENT, FOR THIS ALSO IS A PROOF OF LOVE"

                                    Thomas à Kempis

We do not find Him on the difficult earth,
    In surging human-kind,
In wayside death or accidental birth,
    Or in the "march of mind."

Nature, her nests, her prey, the fed, the caught,
    Hid Him so well, so well,
His steadfast secret there seems to our thought
    Life's saddest miracle.

He's but conjectured in man's happiness,
    Suspected in man's tears,
Or lurks beyond the long, discouraged guess,
    Grown fainter through the years.

* * * * *

But absent, absent now? Ah, what is this,
    Near as in child-birth bed,
Laid on our sorrowful hearts, close to a kiss?
    A homeless childish head.