Find consolation where you can...

A Christmas poem

The Christian calendar in Berwick Church, Sussex. ©John Davies

Four hours I spent winding 
the coloured lights around 
the olive tree in our front
garden. Four hours of telling 
myself be patient, take it 
slowly, unhooking snags on 
broken twigs, carefully winding 
the black cable, with its little 
plastic lights like matchsticks, 
around each of the four main 
branches of the tree. Then 
used a plastic fork, taped to a 
garden prop, to catch the cable 
in its tines and hoist it high 
over the evergreen foliage 
of the tree's crown. 

Slowly, I stepped back to 
admire my handiwork, each 
branch enrapt in a spiral mesh 
like sexy tights. I pushed the 
small round silver drum of the 
power lead into the adaptor's 
socket, and realised, as so 
often before in other situations 
– with a dying friend, my keys 
left in the front door lock, an 
injured cat dropped through a 
window, a fist fight with a 
flatmate, a flight missed, a 
meeting never attended, an 
angry exchange at primary 
school blaming a boy for my 
own forgetfullness, a camera
left unloaded, all these and 
more, evidence of my own 
lack of self possession, and 
self-sabotage – all instances
when I never checked.

I never checked, and that's
why our Christmas lights
will be depleted this year,
and only one tree in our
garden will be bedecked
with light. Even so, I take
some small consolation from 
the work I've completed: 
the branches in their sexy
tights, my ability to stand 
on the topmost step of our 
step ladders without falling 
off, and the conversations 
and anticipation that I've 
enjoyed – wondering if 
I'd checked the lights. 

I’ll be posting again more regularly in 2025, now that I’ve almost completed the full draft of my book about Rowena Cade, Katharine Burdekin and The Minack Theatre, my labour of love entitled ‘Love’s Labours’.

Wishing everyone a very merry Christmas and a very happy and peaceful New Year.