CAUSE OF OUR JOY

CAUSE OF OUR JOY

O Mother of fair love, it was not alone

Christ whom you mothered on the first Christmas night,

not alone the Orient, the splendour that outshone

daylight and suns and all created light.

It was not only this new dearness, kissed and held

in love and lullabies among the straw,

warmed by the breath of oxen that still smelled

of clover and sweet fields.  But in deep awe

there crept in with the shepherd and his sheep

and bowed down with the Oriental king

your other children who will always keep

the joy of your mysterious mothering,

Cause of our joy, heaven’s gate, at once our mother,

on that first Christmas night, through Christ, our Brother.

Sister Maris Stella CSJ

Frost for St Brigid and other poems.  1949. New York: Sheed & Ward

Used with permission