Time to Ponder and Listen

This time of the year is spent in good cheer,
And neighbors together do meet
To sit by the fire, with friendly desire,
Each other in love to greet;
Old grudges forgot are put in the pot,
All sorrows aside they lay;
The old and the young doth carol this song
To drive the cold winter away.
~Traditional

My friend Joyce Ray made my day with the thoughtful parcel she sent for the Winter Poetry Swap. Here's her elegant pantoum:

The Language of Trees
by Joyce Ray

Twigs, sap stilled by cold,
etch brush-stroked Kanji
over gray skies and hold
a promise of spring through winter’s story.

Brush-stroked Kanji etch
tree poems in stick season.
Limbs promise spring and stretch
toward orbs of light to illume and open

the tree poems of stick season
because now is the time to ponder and listen
as light orbs illume and open
Kilmer’s analogy of trees to poems.

Let poets listen. Let poets ponder.
Do trees beckon to hear poems,
stripped of Kilmer’s summer wear,
in winter’s language, plain-spoken?

Perhaps they beckon to hear our prayer
and like twigs, sap stilled by cold,
we’ll pray in the stripped language of winter
against gray skies we must hold.

Joyce also sent chocolates, candles, and a custom ornament
(not pictured because it is already on the tree)

The Poetry Friday round-up is at Buffy's Blog.