Poem:

O come, O come, and be our God-with-us

O long-sought With-ness for a world without, 

O secret seed, O hidden spring of light. 

Come to us Wisdom, come unspoken Name, 

Come Root, and Key, and King, and holy Flame.

O quickened little wick so tightly curled,

Be folded with us into time and place,

Unfold for us the mystery of grace

And make a womb of all this wounded world. 

O heart of heaven beating in the earth, 

O tiny hope within our hopelessness

Come to be born, to bear us to our birth,

To touch a dying world with new-made hands

And make these rags of time our swaddling bands. 

~ Malcolm Guite