Before the paling of the stars,
     Before the winter morn,
Before the earliest cock-crow,
     Jesus Christ was born:
Born in a stable,
     Cradled in a manger,
In the world His hands had made
     Born a stranger.

Priest and King lay fast asleep
     In Jerusalem,
Young and old lay fast asleep
     In crowded Bethlehem:
Saint and Angel, ox and ass,
     Kept a watch together,
Before the Christmas daybreak
     In the winter weather.

Jesus on His Mother’s breast
     In the stable cold,
Spotless Lamb of God was He,
     Shepherd of the fold:
Let us kneel with Mary Maid,
     With Joseph bent and hoary,
With Saint and Angel, ox and ass,
     To hail the King of Glory.

Because you live, though out of sight and reach,
I will, so help me God, live bravely too,
Taking the road with laughter and gay speech,
Alert, intent to give life all its due.
I will delight my soul with many things,
The humours of the street and books and plays,
Great rocks and waves winnowed by seagulls’ wings,
Star-jewelled Winter nights, gold harvest days.

I will for your sake praise what I have missed,
The sweet content of long-united lives,
The sunrise joy of lovers who have kissed,
Children with flower-faces, happy wives.
And last I will praise Death who gives anew
Brave life adventurous and love—and you. 

Will it never be possible
to separate you from your greyness?
Must you be always sinking backward
into your grey-brown landscapes—and trees
always in the distance, always against a grey sky?

                          Must I be always
moving counter to you? Is there no place
where we can be at peace together
and the motion of our drawing apart
be altogether taken up?
                                 I see myself
standing upon your shoulders touching 
a grey, broken sky—
but you, weighted down with me,
yet gripping my ankles,—move
                          laboriously on,
where it is level and undisturbed by colors.