A poem I found

My little office here on the second floor, south facing in our house, is full of stuff I've written in the past. Every once in a while I come across something I have no memory of at all and doubt that I really wrote it.

This poem is one of those. I should have found it back in December when it was the Feast of the Holy Innocents (Dec. 28) which commemorates the children King Herod slaughtered in an effort to kill the "King" the Magi were seeking.

But I didn't. I found it today.

You can imagine yourself back on that much neglected Holy Day, or just read it in May.

THE HOLY INNOCENTS

The Gospel of Matthew 2.16-18

King Herod, slumbering by his table wakes,

from too much wine and dreams of some new King.

His choice he takes, royal decision makes:

“kill them all,” he decrees, “to me blood bring”.

That those children died we too soon forget,

Caught up, as we are, in the Holy Birth.

Shepherds, Mother, Child, Angel wings, and yet,

the innocent ones died...returned to earth.

The Star swings 'round again, again we gaze

at the stable rude, the child sleeping there.

While thousands die, innocent, in our days--

more than we number, far beyond our care.

Innocent in life, in death we must face

that all thing: Known, Unknown are but God's grace.