Poe's Bells

Image by Rdoke via FlickrFrom "The Bells" by Poe with thanks to my wife for teaching me the word "tintinnabulation" ...

Hear the sledges with the bells -
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

Angels for the tree

The Christmas tree looks wonderful, but something was missing and, at first, I didn't even know it.

There are ornaments and ribbons and bows, and I like the simple elegance of white lights with gold and purple trim on the green tree. There's not much history in this tree, however. Not for me. On the old tree, the one I hated putting together every year, and more each year as the branches wore out, there was a story years in the making. There were old ornaments passed down from generations past, and new ones each year that reminded us of something about our family. Now they are gone, physically gone.

The new tree has its memories for my wife and her kids, and she and I bought an ornament, our first together. It makes me smile and think about the future with great anticipation. And today I can add two angels--small, white crochet angels made by the small, tender hands of my grandmother. My mom sent them to me. Somehow she knew something might be missing.