Twas the week before Christmas, when all through my heart

My blood to my head, and my soul comes apart;

Sleepwalking through crises, profuse wear and tear,

Mad hopes that St. Nicholas would answer a prayer;

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,

While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads;

And mamma in her 'kerchief, and I in my cap,

Decided right there, no more sugar-plum crap,

We went out on the lawn and we made such a clatter,

The kids and the neighbors sang "what is the matter?"

My eyes they did roll and my teeth they did gnash,

My heart and my arms they did flail and thrash.

"Look at the hate and the anger," I cried.

"Look at the trees and the birds that have died.

Look at the lies and the myths and the fear,

Look at the truths we try hard to unhear."

Most of the neighbors, they went back to bed,

But the children, they listened, and nodded their head;

They listened as one and the wisdom it came,

Forgotten ways shouted, they called them by name;

"Now, Seeing! Now, Blinking! Now, Hearing and Flowing!

On, Feeling! On, Thinking! On, Learning and Growing!

In the commons we'll share! Divided we'll fall!

Walls that we build will imprison us all!"

As dry wisps that before a tradition does die,

When we meet with an obstacle, mount and defy,

Conventional wisdom may be what we knew,

But now we unthink and rethink and redo.

And then, with a crinkling, old guard undermines,

The future is benched, the past redefines.

But I knew in my head as I was turning around,

The wisdom of children will prevail and astound.

The old will die off and the young will refresh,

With thoughts and ideas that will strengthen and mesh;

With kindness and poise they will pick up the slack.

With passion and reason they'll work to give back.

I will join the young! It's too late to be wary!

I will raise up more clatter and be more contrary!

To those droll little mouths drawn up like a bow,

Those imperious looks that think that they know.

That stump of a brain entrenched in old ways,

The fearful adherents hanging on in a daze;

I'll maintain a broad mind! I'll denounce Machiavelli!

I'll steer clear of groupthink and the old underbelly!

No more chubby and plump! No more pompous old elf!

I'll laugh and I'll cry and I'll find a new self!

With a wink and a nod and a twist of their head,

The children will look to the future instead;

Believing they can, and knowing they must,

The children will fill all our stockings with trust.

Obeying the knowing uncertainty knows,

The children, I trust, they will not presuppose;

So perhaps we won't slay our Santa just yet,

Perhaps he still lives through our hearts and our sweat,

And perhaps through our children he'll grow erudite,

I believe in the children. Happy Christmas. Good Night.