No night could be darker than this night, no cold so cold,
as the blood snaps like a wire
and the heart’s sap stills,
and the year seems defeated.

O never again, it seems, can green things run, or sky birds fly,
or the grass exhale its humming breath, powdered with pimpernels,
from this dark lung of winter.
Yet here are lessons from the final mile of pilgrim kings;
the mile still left when all have reached their tether’s end:
that mile where the Child lies hid.

For see, beneath the hand, the earth already warms and glows;
for men with shepherd’s eyes there are signs in the dark,
the turning stars, the lamb’s returning time.
Out of this utter death he’s born again, his birth our Saviour;
from terror’s equinox, he climbs and grows, drawing his finger’s light across our blood
– the sun of heaven and the Son of God.

 -Laurie Lee, My Many-Coated Man (1955)