Wood At Christmas Poem by Steve Morris

The tree the children have chosen
from the forest
is always too tall;
your adult hands, bonded
to it by frost, scrape
against the door-jambs.

So, in the darkening shed,
too late to sharpen
reluctant tools,
you cut and trim,
try not to lose too much
of what the children had seen.

Now it stands there
and they, having strewn it
with lights and miniature
wooden offerings,
are in their beds.

In the quiet firelight
the tree is
- almost -
singing.