Any Christmas

Not for the last time
he casts his lot
with small children-
the smallest, in fact-
this Jesus baby,
this child God.
Which means indeed
that no human experience
is lost on him
and no indignity unglimpsed.
And even if his own home was safely sound,
his parents model, if somewhat unusual-
his mother given to weird convictions,
his father perhaps not all he seemed,
and even if in spite of all
he kept a purity of delight
in life’s other smallnesses
of feather and flower,
still there is the truth
that no violation of the smallest human
is unknown to him,
forced as he was to flee for his life newborn.
So all the sordid ugliness
and threat of the world
was carried in his soul,
buried in his memory,
and burst from him that day
when his last words
came full circle-
the cries of any child uttered
thirty three years late and forever-
Father, forgive, they know not what they do,
Why have you abandoned me,
I thirst.
Any child.