And so it begins...




I cast on for the scarf/stole thing last night (It's not as wide as the stoles I normally make but wider than the scarves). I'm smack on gauge, which surprises me a little, because I think this yarn is actually a bit heavier than what's recommended. It's hard to see the lace pattern right now since it's early in the knitting and also the thing will need blocking when it's done.

The color is hard to describe - a photo doesn't really do it justice. It's cranberry-ish, but there's also a hint of russet or brownish red there. It is much like the toned-down reds seen in some old Persian or "Oriental" rugs.

*****

I know I'm doing a lot of Christmas stuff here, and if you don't celebrate the day (either because you celebrate something else, or because of family or grief reasons you don't want to celebrate), I apologize. But I love Christmas, both as a holiday and a holy day.

I have a little book of Christmas poems, and although some of the ones from the era of Milton and Smart are pretty impenetrable, and the modern ones are generally (as you might expect) pretty awful (either doggerel or what I feel is an inappropriate attempt to politicize the holiday and make people feel guilty for celebrating it), there are a few gems.

One of my favorites is Noel: Christmas Eve, 1913, by Robert Bridges.

I've tried in vain to find a version of it on line. I can't remember the whole poem - or even remember any of it well enough now to reproduce it here. It's a lovely poem, perhaps a bit anachronistic, because it's a simple celebration of the holiness of the night and the good spirit of the people celebrating it. It has a line in it that says something like "I bless the people of this country, who are ringing the bells tonight". It's a very quiet poem and very suggestive of someone standing on a hill as evening falls with the snow and looking down on the town he knows and loves.

Some of the poem was lifted and turned into a song (most famously, at least for people of my generation, on the John Denver Christmas with the Muppets [yes, those Muppets] album). The lyrics are here but they cut out a lot of the loveliness of the poem (and all the references to England). (I fear you can't find the whole poem on line because someone has the rights to it still - perhaps one of the people who adapted it into the song).

Robert Bridges. I didn't know much about him. Apparently he was Poet Laureate of England for a time. More, with links to some of his poems.

it makes me a little sad that Google remembers "Christmas Eve, 1913" pretty much only as connected to John Denver. And I love John Denver. I just wish the person who actually wrote the poem was a bit more prominent among the search results.