Christmas Every Week: Gloria In Excelsis
Arnold Kellett’s poem suggests that a vandal’s stone can reveal the true nature of God.
A snowball fight - outside a church:
Compacted hard as stone
Snowballs soar through icy air,
By strong-armed urchins thrown:
A smash of glass! The warriors flee;
Inside the church the vicar stops
His Christmas preparations,
And sees, aghast, the damage done:
Of all the desecrations
None worse than this! How sad to see
The beauteous stained-glass window marred:
The Christ-child's angel choirs!
A pane has gone - a gaping hole!
No message now inspires,
For 'Glory to God in the highest' reads,
With the letter E knocked out,
'Glory to God in the High-St(reet)
But these words have quite a clout;
The vicar looks, and feels inspired:
Here's a text on which he'll preach!
Let High Street air come into church,
And churches ever outwards reach,
And touch our streets with Christmas truth:
Glory to God throughout the town!
On every home and place of work
Let joyful tidings shimmer down;
No stained-glass God, unreal, remote,
But down to earth, involved in time,
Conveying through this quaint misquote
Celestial grace and love sublime:
From highest heaven to basest earth,
See Christ the Saviour-King descend!
This is the measure of his birth:
The Lord who loves us to the end;
No palace pleasures shall he know,
Nor cushioned comforts wealth can show,
Stable-born, the dust he'll tread:
The Sinner's Friend, who wept and bled;
Through crowded street and market place
The God who wears a human face ...
The vicar now is pleased to see
The fragments of his letter E;
So glad that God, on Christmas Days,
Still moves in such mysterious ways.
