Winter Solstice 2020

The sun touches the Tropic of Capricorn . 

Jupiter and Saturn share their shine.  

A vaccine for the rich

arrives at warp speed.

Money for rent

comes at a snail’s pace. 

The stock market goes high,

The food lines get long.

 The air is as full of lies

as the hospital beds are full of people

gasping for breath. 

“I can’t breathe” echoes

And echoes

And echoes. .

The night is very long and very dark. 

We cannot even draw together

to warm each other.

What shall we do? 

Even alone 

we will do what we have been practicing all our lives:

Light

Yule logs, 

Hanukkah candles, 

and Christmas trees. 

Sing songs of courage and carols of joy, 

or the kind of songs you make up when you have had too much to drink. 

 Read or remember stories 

about how the darkness almost conquered

a soul

or the world, 

and then the light shined in.

As I write, the sun is rising. 

Even the longest night 

cannot hold back 

the new day. 

15 thoughts on “Winter Solstice 2020”

  1. Yes, all of those things have and are happening. Today is a new day. The slate is clean. Do the best you can. God has answered the prayers that a vaccine be found. We all have the opportunity to light a candle in the darkness. Leave some cookies on your neighbor’s doorstep.

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  2. Just what i needed. thank you for your timely observations Rogers. “There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in”. Here’s to the 2020 Crack. Merry Happy to you. Jacquie and family. And ONWARD to 2021!

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  3. Love this, as always, Roger. We have plenty of light here since we’ve gotten lots of snow so there’s white on the ground, and when it stops snowing, we’ll get the only blue skies we see all winter. (That’s the one gift of snow here, as you may recall, though actually I love it quite apart from the gift of a sunny day when it stops snowing.) We wish you a lovely Christmas and good health, peace, light and good cheer for the new year.

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