A Covid Christmas

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._N._Taber 

Here in the UK and many homes around the world, people will be wondering how best to spend Christmas, where we should risk seeing family and friends, much as we would love to, while Covid-19 remains active.

No matter how we choose to celebrate Christmas, whether for religious reasons, being with family and friends, or both, it is, like any religious festival, a time for taking stock of any discrepancies between where we are in life and where we hoped or expected to be. 

Religion may well help us find answers, while many who follow another religion (or none at all) invariably face the same questions. 

Most of us are left to find our own answers in our own way, whether guided by Divine inspiration or not. Regular readers may recall the old aborigine I met in Australia; in so far as he pointed me in a direction I had always wanted to follow, but which had been closed to me for various reasons, he was a life-saver. It meant returning to the UK and many things (and people) I had been running away from, but, in time, I would find such peace of mind as I’d felt impossible since leaving school barely five years earlier. 

“I feel so alone,” I remember whingeing. 

“Well, you are not alone now,” he chuckled, “… and two heads are better than one, so let’s see if we can’t set you on the right track, yeah?” I nodded, and he did.  

Every Christmas, I drink a toast to that old man. He is probably long dead by now, but his presence is as real to me as it was all those years ago. That is the wonderful magic of memory; no one ever dies who has been meaningful in our lives. Better still, it allows us to pick and choose, reject unwelcome guests and join together with those who have brought light into our lives.

Many of us will be alone this Christmas, but the Gates of Memory are open 24/7. Besides, there is also telephone. zoom and other technologies to help us out as and when ….

 A COVID CHRISTMAS 

Outside, world looking grey
even where sounds of children’s
laughter breaking through
weary faces and muted voices,
reliving such yesteryears
as mind and spirit better able
to redeem a host
more anxious to explore than exploit
Earth Mother 

Outside, a diversity of masks,
driving home the necessity to care
as much for the well-being
of others as any twinned selves
struggling to put caution
before desire rather than throw
either to the wind …
if only to be seen doing the right thing
by humankind 

Inside, a diversity of humanity
making its way down Memory Lane
among fairy lights
and Christmas trees, choir voices
singing songs of praise,
families and friends making merry,
putting aside any misery,
as only such togetherness has succeeded
in all its history 

Outside, Covid-19 hell bent on having a say;
inside, Christmas continues to have its way

Copyright R.N. Taber 2020

 [Note: This post-poem also appears on my general poetry blog.]