Candlemas Day

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Title:     Candlemas Day
Author: Frances Ridley Havergal [More Titles by Havergal]

YES, take the greenery away
That smiled to welcome Christmas Day,
Untwine the drooping ivy spray.

The holly leaves are dusty all,
Whose glossy darkness robed the wall,
And one by one the berries fall.

Take down the yew, for with a touch
The leaflets drop, as -wearied much
With light and song, unused to such.

Poor evergreens! Why proudly claim
The glory of your lovely name,
So soon meet only for the flame?

Another Christmas Day will show
Another green and scarlet glow,
A fresh array of mistletoe.

And this new beauty, arch or crown,
Will stiffen, gather dust, grow brown,
And in its turn be taken down.

To-night the walls will seem so bare!
Ah, well! look out, look up, for there
The Christmas stars are always fair.

They will be shining just as clear
Another and another year,
O'er all our darkened hemisphere.

So Christmas mirth has fleeted fast,
The songs of time can never last,
And all is buried with the past.

But Christmas love and joy and peace
Shall never fade and never cease,
Of God's goodwill the rich increase.

[The end]
Frances Ridley Havergal's poem: Candlemas Day

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