Christmas Bells

On this Christmas Day 2018 when the world seems so topsy-turvy, I give you the words of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, written on Christmas Day 1863 in the middle of the American Civil War. (It was published two years later, February 1865.) The poem starts out rather melancholy, moves to despair, and ends in hope. 

May you find joy and hope in the notion that wrong shall fail and right prevail this holiday season. A voice, a chime, a chant sublime - Merry Christmas!

Christmas Bells

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I heard the bells on Christmas Day

Their old, familiar carols play,

    And wild and sweet

    The words repeat

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And thought how, as the day had come,

The belfries of all Christendom

    Had rolled along

    The unbroken song

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Till ringing, singing on its way,

The world revolved from night to day,

    A voice, a chime,

    A chant sublime

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Then from each black, accursed mouth

The cannon thundered in the South,

    And with the sound

    The carols drowned

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

It was as if an earthquake rent

The hearth-stones of a continent,

    And made forlorn

    The households born

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And in despair I bowed my head;

“There is no peace on earth," I said;

    “For hate is strong,

    And mocks the song

Of peace on earth, good-will to men!”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:

“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;

    The Wrong shall fail,

    The Right prevail,

With peace on earth, good-will to men.”