Songs of Bethlehem: Nativity Poems

By Kemmer Anderson

Songs of Bethlehem: Nativity Poems follows my journey from Israel to cleaning stalls at a horse barn in North Carolina. The poems range from free verse images such as Barn smell: scents from the Ark to sonnet rhymes like But this childs beating heart / alters Roman policy from the start. The poems reflect the geography of Palestine and the political tensions between the occupation of the Roman army and the messianic faith of Jerusalem. The poems chart the making of a poet as I explored the incarnational history that surrounds the biblical narrative whose characters inhabit the place of Bethlehem.

From The Magis Epiphany
In the end a child brought us down to earth,
The old abstractions fell apart in Bethlehem.
What I once knew by dream, I now know by proof.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 5, 2014
• ISBN: 9781503519831

Kemmer Anderson

Kemmer Anderson, a graduate of Davidson College, has for years taught Homer’s Odyssey and Iliad at McCallie School, in Chattanooga, Tennessee. In 1991 while studying for a M.A. at St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, he learned about Palamedes from Plato’s dialogues. Since that time he and his wife Martha have wandered through Greece in pursuit of his story. The author of 2 poetry books, Wing Shadows Over Walden Ridge and Songs of Bethlehem: Nativity Poems, he continues to work on series of essays: Milton at Monticello.

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Copyright © 2014 by Kemmer Anderson.

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Rev. date: 12/02/2014

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Bus To Bethlehem

Birth

Incarnation

A New Creation

Annunciation

Mary

Mary’s Grace

Incarnation Of Love

Joseph

Incarnate Sound

Poem Measures For Mary

Incarnation Creed

Incarnation History

The Epiphany Window

The Swaddled Sign

Incarnate Vision

Gabriel’s Christology

My Muse With Angels Sing

The Alabaster Flask

Crèche Angels

Bethlehem Song

Narrow Gate

Christ’s Nest

Inn Sight

Birth Of A Priest

A Bethlehem Shepherd

Zeke, The Shepherd’s Dog

A Shepherd From Bethlehem

Stable Light

The Shepherd Of Doubt

Olive Tree Psalm

Bethlehem Road

If

The Innkeeper’s Story

Christ Time

The Song Of Simeon

Epiphany 2014

The Star

The Magi’s Epiphany

Holy Innocents

Escape To Egypt

Affidavit:

The Scribe’s Tale

Christ’s Amnesty

The Magi Of Peace

Just Light

Christmas Eve Candle

Advent 1917

Cave Light

Madonna Number 5

Destin Bethlehem

Haitian Epiphany

Hebron 1994

Bullet From Bethlehem

Bethlehem: 2002

Christmas Hope

Sailing For Patmos

The Scribe Prochoros Addresses The Evangelist

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thanks to editors for publishing the following poems:

Christian Century: Sailing for Patmos, Hebron 1994; Poetic Page: The Magi’s Epiphany Madonna Number 5; Sharing: Bus to Bethlehem, Olive Tree Psalm; Davidson Journal: Bethlehem 2002.

Other poems have appeared in the Wesleyan Advocate, Time of Singing, and Lutheran Journal.

The cover art THE VISIT OF THE MAGI an original painting by (c) Suzy Baggett for the Stations of Nativity at St. Francis of Assisi Episcopal Church, Ooltewah, Tennessee.

Bus to Bethlehem

Let us go now even unto Bethlehem (Luke 2:15).

In the early morning my wife and I rushed through the Old City of Jerusalem to the Damascus Gate. At the place of the skull, Golgotha stared over the Arab bus station with empty sunken eye sockets.

Martha and I ran across the black pavement of a jammed bus parking lot that echoed with goat bells and bus horns. The smells of the Mideast market mixed with the stench of carbon monoxide fumes. Bus number 22 was a gray GM school bus with peeling green paint and white Arabic letters. Price: 15 shekels.

The old bus wound out of Jerusalem through the Judean Hills of sheep, olive trees, and limestone. The bus rumbled from side to side in iambic pentameter. I am going to write Jesus the best Christmas poem ever, I think.

During eight years of stable work in North Carolina and Tennessee, I prepared my heart to see Bethlehem. On Sunday