Look, as this new day is born
Peaceful is this cold morn’
Bells ringing across the land
Say violence is banned!
Today, Christmas day
Hear now, listen to my lai:
Let’s cleanse our hearts of woe
Joyfully shall we now go
To celebrate our joy
‘Twas born Mary’s boy!
Then, the seed of peace was sown,
Something we’d never known,
Pray that it may now grow strong
And fill our hearts yearlong,
With love, hope and peace.
When I first discovered choka, I also discovered that this poetic form is all but extinct, though some modern Japanese poets have written a few and there is a small movement to try to revive it, it’s mostly in the West that the choka is finding new life. Now it’s possible to find “classical” (either 5-7-7 or 5-7-5 syllable count) choka written by American or English haiku poets and very interestingly we also find some experimental choka – variations created by Western haiku poets.
In 2013, I tried my hand at creating an experimental choka a Rhyming Choka : 7-6-7-6-5 syllable lines repeated 3 times … rhymes in couplets until the last line.
red, blue and yellow
lights and decorations glow
brightening our hearts
on this longest winter night
with family and friends
toasting the season with cheer
the tree stands prepared
dressed in baubles and tinsel
now here we await
the dawn of Christmas morning
as we sing “Joy to the World”
Somehow, when it’s 42° C Christmas doesn’t feel quite right. We read the Christmas Carol to the kids and watched Christmas specials on French TV as we decorated the living-room with plastic holly and baubles trying to recreate that special atmosphere.
Packages from America had arrived far in advance and it had been difficult to hide them from the children, but we managed it! On Christmas eve, me mounted the tiny tree putting the gifts under it on the dining room table and hung two beautifully decorated stockings on the window sill filled with candy canes and other goodies.
The next morning the kids were starry-eyed with awe. Gift wrapping flew around the room as they ripped open their packages with laughter. We had our traditional Christmas breakfast and I put a couple of chickens in the oven with dressing for our dinner which we would be sharing with our friends, a French couple with their children and a scholarly gentleman and his wife from Iran. My mincedfruit and pumpkin pies would be a great end to our meal.
There was a moment of silence in all the bustle and I heard that beautiful lilting chant that accompanied us throughout each day we lived in Djibouti. The muezzin reciting the ahdan or call to prayer … Allah’u’akbar floated into the room. Suddenly it felt very much like Christmas to me as I remembered that He who was born that day, was born in a warm desert land, not in a snow drifted winter wonder land.
It’s probably not “politically correct” to remember that Islam derives from Judaism and Christianity. Each of the great monotheisms has taken a different path and has its own bright and dark history. The God of Abraham is also the God of Christ and the God of Mohammed. I came across an article on CBS Minnesota .. the school choir master has included in the Holiday Concert repertoire a song about Ramadan to be performed in Arabic. A brave symbol of pluralism in these trouble times. My first Christmas wish for us is that we will be so brave as to embrace the spirit of peace and love which we profess.
Noreen Crone-Findlay talks about the crafts she loves with her friend, Tottie Tomato. They'll be sharing tutorials, how to's and step by steps for spool knitting, crochet, doll making, small loom weaving, wood working, paper crafts and all manner of other fun crafts. This is a family friendly blog.
Carpe Diem's Tanka Splendor is part of the Carpe Diem Haiku Family. It's a weekly tanka-meme in which you can write and share tanka inspired on a given prompt every Saturday (mostlty, sometimes it will be on another day).
Noreen Crone-Findlay talks about the crafts she loves with her friend, Tottie Tomato. They'll be sharing tutorials, how to's and step by steps for spool knitting, crochet, doll making, small loom weaving, wood working, paper crafts and all manner of other fun crafts. This is a family friendly blog.
Carpe Diem's Tanka Splendor is part of the Carpe Diem Haiku Family. It's a weekly tanka-meme in which you can write and share tanka inspired on a given prompt every Saturday (mostlty, sometimes it will be on another day).