Poem 145- (This is) Our Christmas Song

It’s the season of Advent (in the church calendar, this starts four Sundays before Christmas, not on the 1st Dec.), and so to celebrate I’ve finally organised a proper domain name for this site (www.odefortheday.art) and written a Christmas carol:

Verse 1:
What did it mean for you our holy king
To put on human flesh and leave
Casting aside eternal dreams
To be born the son of Mary

Verse 2:
Experience our hopes and fears
Share in our sorrow, our sufferings
Embrace the passing of the years
To be born the son of Mary

Chorus:
And so we sing, our Christmas song
Our praises ring, all season long
For the Son of God has come to us
Immanuel, now one of us
Yes this is, our Christmas song!

Verse 3:
You came obedient to the end
To a manger bare in Bethlehem
The gift of God by Father sent
To be born the son of Mary

Verse 4:
An invitation in your hand
Offering the chance to begin again
Sing out the news across the land
About the son of Mary

Chorus:
And so we sing, our Christmas song
Our praises ring, all season long
For the Son of God has come to us
Immanuel, now one of us
Yes this is, our Christmas song!

This is a first draft, no doubt it will evolve, but it was fun trying something a little different to a straight poem. It came about as a result of a challenge to write a Christmas song that sticks to the original story without too many cliches.
(29.11.22)

© Ben Quant 2022

The Pause

I’ve been more than a little quiet on the poetry front recently, and may remain so for a little longer. Let me explain….

Some of you may be aware that alongside writing poems last year, I was also writing my thesis for a DMin (Doctor of Ministry) – I’m a church minister as well as a dabbler in verse. If you read Poem 71 – The Verdict, you would have picked up that it didn’t quite go to plan… My thesis as it stood was failed in my viva, and they sent me away with a year to rewrite and submit if I wanted to. I won’t go into all the ins and outs here, but I won’t lie, I was and am still angry and emotional about this, as Poem 71 might suggest! Still, I’ve got on with it, and am currently crashing through the final chapters. This is taking a lot of time and attention as it is a complete rewrite, and I’ve not got time/emotion to spare for poems alongside this and work (a family wedding was another distraction, but much nicer, see Poem 137!) I’m aiming at getting a complete draft done by the end of September if I can, and so hopefully after then the poems will begin to reappear more regularly.

Today I’m celebrating having completed a major milestone, a significant chapter finished! It suddenly all begins to look a little more possible. Time for a deep breath and I’ll see you on the other side!

Poem 58 – Service Update

Poetic delays
Caused by congestion ahead
Expect disruption

Discovering right now that writing daily poems and running a church during Advent and preparing for a viva, is a little too much. Normal service will be resumed in due course…
(14.12.21)

© Ben Quant 2021