Bethlehem

Winters grow worse in

days of plague and war,

the next disaster and

the cupboards gone bare. Lights

strewn about the neighborhood 

burdened by the branding—

nativity tableaux surrounded by

Santa and Frosty and Mickey Mouse—

all the claimants to that gloried throne

crowding out the senior myths

as people bemoan their quarantine 

isolations in silver and gold.

A year of new names for each 

full moon and incessant astrology,

the biases built into cognition—

cock crowing at midnight,

the hawk outside the window—

gathered up like torch and pitchfork 

to mob the monster, like 

the slings and arrows insisted by 

outrageous fate while the hard

lonesome of the holidays kicks

my teeth clean down my throat. 

So the old wanderers encircling 

the stars intersect, gods crossing

paths to double down on

the fierce, faraway albedo alluding 

Yeats stamped into our dumb tongue.

Behold! The story sold to deny

meaning, our language 

littered with shiny baubles and

bright pretty lights so we never 

see the world we witness. 

Made up miracles,

heaven’s lies burning bright.