Christmas Poetry

By John Milton, Rudyard Kipling and Robert Louis Stevenson

Christmas, they say, comes but once a year. In these days it seems to also last for much of that year.

For the religious amongst us this annual celebration of the Birth of Christ must seem bitter sweet; it’s acknowledgment by billions of people countered by the pervasive spread of material possessions translating the event to little more than a sales pitch for their own wares.

Most religions celebrate their founders but Christianity seems somehow to have lost possession of one of its key rituals in an ever more secular West. The spread of globalisation seems to have hindered rather than helped the true meaning of the festival. Children today are much more interested in what presents they might receive than any spiritual message. As parents too, most of us buy into this and we seem to indulge our offspring rather than the themes and aims of the festival’s meaning common to us all.

In this collection we rely on the words and wisdom of such fine poets as John Milton, Emily Dickinson, Sir Walter Scott, Daniel Sheehan, Wordsworth, Longfellow and a whole host of others to absorb us in a Christmas time of hope and togetherness set amongst a landscape of winter wonderment and Nature’s palest palette. The experiences and memories they share with us speak of a time, of a world that did have a common purpose and an ambition to share good fortune with everyone.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Portable Poetry
• Release date: Nov 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9781835470572

John Milton

John Milton (1608-1657) was an English poet and intellectual. Milton worked as a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England and wrote during a time of religious change and political upheaval. Having written works of great importance and having made strong political decisions, Milton was of influence both during his life and after his death. He was an innovator of language, as he would often introduce Latin words to the English canon, and used his linguistic knowledge to produce propaganda and censorship for the English Republic’s foreign correspondence. Milton is now regarded as one of the best writers of the English language, exuding unparalleled intellect and talent.

Book preview

Christmas Poetry

An Introduction

Christmas, they say, comes but once a year.  In these days it seems to also last for much of that year.

For the religious amongst us this annual celebration of the Birth of Christ must seem bitter sweet; it’s acknowledgment by billions of people countered by the pervasive spread of material possessions translating the event to little more than a sales pitch for their own wares.

Most religions celebrate their founders but Christianity seems somehow to have lost possession of one of its key rituals in an ever more secular West.  The spread of globalisation seems to have hindered rather than helped the true meaning of the festival.  Children today are much more interested in what presents they might receive than any spiritual message.  As parents too, most of us buy into this and we seem to indulge our offspring rather than the themes and aims of the festival’s meaning common to us all. 

In this collection we rely on the words and wisdom of such fine poets as John Milton, Emily Dickinson, Sir Walter Scott, Daniel Sheehan, Wordsworth, Longfellow and a whole host of others to absorb us in a Christmas time of hope and togetherness set amongst a landscape of winter wonderment and Nature’s palest palette.  The experiences and memories they share with us speak of a time, of a world that did have a common purpose and an ambition to share good fortune with everyone. 

Index of Contents

On the Morning of Christs Nativity by John Milton

Nativity by John Donne

Carol by Ben Jonson

A Christmas Carol by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The Nativity by Henry Vaughan

An Ode of the Birth of Our Saviour by Robert Herrick

New Prince New Pomp by Robert Southwell

A Christmas Carol by Aubrey De Vere

The Nativity of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by Christopher Smart

The Three Kings by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

A Christmas Carol by G K Chesterton

The Beautiful Mother by Jacopone da Todi

Upon Christ His Birth by Sir John Suckling

No Mercy Here by Daniel Sheehan

A Nativity by Rudyard Kipling

God Rest by Daniel Sheehan

The Oxen by Thomas Hardy

A Visit From St Nicholas ('Twas The Night Before Christmas) by Clement Moore

Old Christmastide (An Extract) by Sir Walter Scott

Christmas Eve by Christina Rossetti

The Snow Storm by Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Snow Man by Wallace Stevens

The First Snowfall by James Russell Lowell

The White Snow by Guillaume Apollinaire

Christmas Bells by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Ring Out Wild Bells. Christmas Poem by Alfred lord Tennyson

Minstrels.  A Christmas Poem by William Wordsworth

As Sleigh Bells Seem In Summer by Emily Dickinson

Christmas At Sea by Robert Louis Stevenson

The House of Christmas by G K Chesterton

The Burning Babe by Robert Southwell

Winter Sunset by Katharine Tynan

Joseph by G K Chesterton

Winter Evening Hymn To My Fire by James Russell Lowell

In The Bleak Midwinter by Christina Georgina Rossetti

The Farm Woman's Winter by Thomas Hardy

The Savior Must Have Been A Docile Gentleman by Emily Dickinson

Winter by Robert Louis Stevenson

Christmas Carol by Sara Teasdale

Winter Heavens by George Meredith

The Mahogany Tree by William Makepeace Thackeray

Christmas Fancies by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

The Masque of Christmas by Ben Jonson

Christmas For Atheists by Daniel Sheehan

Christmas Poem by Robert Herrick

December Sales Drive by Daniel Sheehan

The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy

The Mother of God by William Butler Yeats

A Christmas Ghost Story by Thomas Hardy

A New Years Eve in Wartime by Thomas Hardy

Ghosts of the Old Year by James Weldon Johnson

'Twas Just This Time Last Year I Died by Emily Dickinson

The Meeting by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Old Year by John Clare

The Death of the Old