Kate Flora: I’ve probably said this here too much, that for my writing, when I’m looking for fresh images, fresh language, or a new way of illuminating my scenes or my characters, or to create a mood, I will turn to poetry books. (I also turn to them for titles when a book refuses the name I’ve given it.) Sometimes there will be so many books scattered on the floor around my desk that I have to practically hop on one foot to get out of the room.

Right now, as a treat for the holiday season, I am reading Jeanette Winterson’s Christmas Days: 12 stories and 12 Feasts for 12 Days. So far, I’ve learned a lot about Christmas that I hadn’t known. That the Puritans banned it. That the reason Santa’s suit is red is because of a coca cola ad. That the Christmas tree, which I always assumed was a long time continuation of pagan solstice celebrations, became popular in 1848 when Victoria and Albert posed beside their holiday tree. I haven’t even gotten to the stories yet, but I’m hoping for inspiration there, since I write a Christmas story every year and the clock is running.

But I said this was about illuminations, didn’t I, which also brings us in touch with the darkness. So here are some poems for this season to read and ponder on.

To Know the Dark by Wendell Berry

To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,

and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.

Snowy Night by Mary Oliver

Last night, an owl
in the blue dark
tossed an indeterminate number
of carefully shaped sounds into
the world, in which,
a quarter of a mile away, I happened
to be standing.
I couldn’t tell
which one it was –
the barred or the great-horned
ship of the air –
it was that distant. But, anyway,
aren’t there moments
that are better than knowing something,
and sweeter? Snow was falling,
so much like stars
filling the dark trees
that one could easily imagine
its reason for being was nothing more
than prettiness. I suppose
if this were someone else’s story
they would have insisted on knowing
whatever is knowable – would have hurried
over the fields
to name it – the owl, I mean.
But it’s mine, this poem of the night,
and I just stood there, listening and holding out
my hands to the soft glitter
falling through the air. I love this world,
but not for its answers.
And I wish good luck to the owl,
whatever its name –
and I wish great welcome to the snow,
whatever its severe and comfortless
and beautiful meaning.

The Shortest Day by Susan Cooper

So the shortest day came, and the year died,

And everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white world

Came people singing, dancing,

To drive the dark away.

They lighted candles in the winter trees;

They hung their homes with evergreen;

They burned beseeching fires all night long

To keep the year alive,

And when the new year’s sunshine blazed awake

They shouted, reveling.

Through all the frosty ages you can hear them

Echoing behind us—Listen!!

All the long echoes sing the same delight,

This shortest day,

As promise wakens in the sleeping land:

They carol, feast, give thanks,

And dearly love their friends,

And hope for peace.

And so do we, here, now,

This year and every year.

Welcome Yule!

Approaching Solstice by Patricia Monaghan

Yes, friends, the darkness wins but these

short days so celebrate light:

today, the lemon sunrise lasted a few

hours until sunset, all day the snow

glowed pink and purple in the trees.

This is not a time of black and white.

My friend, outside us, among us too,

let’s sing what winter forces us to know:

Joy and colour bloom despite the night.

We measure warmth by love, not by degrees.