I love Christmas. My mother instilled that love in my heart as long ago as I can remember. It is a time of good cheer and sharing. A time of hope and forgiveness. A last chance to get it right before the year ends and a new one begins. Christmas cookies and cracking fires. The smell of food cooking. The gleam in a child’s wide eyes as they stand in line holding their parent’s hands while they wait to sit in the lap of a department store Santa Claus. Hot chocolate. Cinnamon and clove.
Today I am formally announcing my “Rhyme and Reason Countdown to Christmas.” It begins today and goes on through Christmas Day. The material I am offering is also featured in the Benicia Herald (My hometown newspaper) on the same days I post it for you all to read on Facebook.
For the five years I have been writing and offering poems for all of you, I have written many narrative stories about what Christmas means to me. Stories of my life experience. Tales of friends and lovers. Parables of mystical characters and elves. Poems about decorating and shopping. My hope is you share these pieces with friends and family and spread my messages of love, inclusion and well… our shared human experience. I welcome people of all colors and creeds to join together and come together. When it’s all said and done, Christmas is about love. John Lennon and Paul McCartney once said in a song, “Love is all you need.” I think they were on to something.
Merry Christmas
Jefe

Presents wrapped in paper,
Pretty ribbons, lace and bows
Are delivered to your doorstep
Every Christmas when it snows

It may be a card or cake
An Xbox or some candy
Maybe you might get a tool
That sometimes comes in handy

Here I go again
I must decide a gift to give
Something that goes on and on
As long as we both live

So listen; hear the angels sing
From Heaven up above
Accept this gift I give to you
That’s known as “All my love.”

Jeff Burkhart’s “Rhyme and Reason”
© Copyright, December, 2014
All Rights Reserved

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