Welcome back to The Daily Poem, a podcast from Goldberry Studios.

I'm Sean Johnson, and today is Thursday, December 12, 2004.

Today's poem comes from Christina Rosetti, and there's a good chance that you've already encountered it once this year.

If not, I'm sure it's coming.

The poem's called A Christmas Carol, although it's often known by its first phrase in the bleak midwinter.

This poem was set to music, most notably by Gustav Holtz.

His arrangement is the most recognizable, but there are others.

At any rate, it is much more common to encounter it as a song,

hymn now than as a poem. But here are the original lyrics. I'll read them once, offer a few

comments, and then read them one more time. A Christmas Carol. In the bleak midwinter,

frosty wind made moan. Earth stood hard as iron, water like stone.

Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow, snow on snow. In the bleak midwinter, long ago.

Our God, heaven cannot hold him, nor earth sustain. Heaven and earth shall flee away when he

comes to rain. In the bleak midwinter, a stable place sufficed the Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.

Enough for him, whom cherubim worship night and day, breastful of milk and a manger full of hay. Enough for him,

whom angels fall before, the ox and ass and camel which adore. Angels and archangels

may have gathered there, cherubim and seraphim thronged the air, but his mother only, in her maiden

bliss, worshipped the beloved with a kiss.

What can I give him, poor as I am?

If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb.

If I were a wise man, I would do my part.

Yet what I can, I give him, give him my heart.

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