Alfred Lord Tennyson (
1809-
1892)
With such compelling cause to
grieve
As daily vexes household peace,
And chains regret to his decease,
How dare we keep our
Christmas-eve;
Which brings no more a welcome guest
To enrich the threshold of the night
With shower’d largess of delight
In dance and song and game and jest?
Yet go, and while the
holly boughs
Entwine the cold
baptismal font,
Make one
wreath more for
Use and Wont,
That guard the portals of the house;
Old sisters of a day gone by,
Gray nurses, loving nothing new;
Why should they miss their yearly due
Before their time? They too will
die.