Reflection On A Nativity Scene

REFLECTION ON A NATIVITY SCENE

Effigies in miniature they stand illuminating,
reminding of that grand memory, of that starry night.
And, standing, they beckon,
casting the imagination to that shepherd night of Bethlehem:
the stage, the lights, the manger;
etching those passages into the course of history:
a mother, a moonlit chamber, a child in swaddling clothes.
Forced into the still night of the stable, into the realm of flesh;
thrust from the radiance of eternity.

It is a memory of that culmination of eternal counsel
planted at birth into every human soul.
A memory running with us through the years
to emerge with each Christmas season
though it is never quite far away.

A memory that, having changed all that precedes it,
transforms, transfixes the meaning and foundation of existence.
A memory transforming all that it touches, leaving nothing inert;
changing the despair of pagan man.
Grand entrance of a fathomless revelation!

All else is a facade; all else is mere illusion and divergence:
music, colors (resplendent colors of harmony:
gold, green, red, crimson red, fluffy white,
stringy sparkling silver), movement(whirling and offsetting).
It is too earthy, too transient.

In the world of humanity, it creates only an illusion
of that palpable arena of peace, of love, of giving,
and of brotherly love that cannot be universal here.

It is an ember lighting the night, flying outward...and is gone...
It rushes as quickly as the last feet of reeled celluloid
from reality to ephemeral smoky memory.

But it is a glorious facade of white Christmas,
silver bells, sleigh rides, snow-swept moonlit
panoramas, misty breath in the air,
a mug of hot chocolate resting upon the hearth of a brick fireplace.

The blackboard of every heart contains that marching memory,
the estimation of value that Christ places on every man.
He provides the good and the beautiful.
He gives purpose.
“In swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.”

Folding the cardboard animals, removing the straw,
returning the borrowed doll cradle will not erase the season, the memory.
Those relics—props—will ever transcend time
and represent that starry announcement:
“A savior which is Christ the Lord!”