In Tinsel Time

In tinsel time the bells do chime. We deck the halls and shopping malls with plastic bough and holly wreath. The conjured tricks that lie beneath the plastic magic make-believe pull cheap tradition from the empty sleeve and, with the angel chorus on demand, demand the payment of the damned by overdraft and plastic cards, with season's greetings and regards for Christmas Joy and Yuletide Cheer; the end of one more bloody year. In tinsel time the bells do chime the dance of money and the mime of love's best giving soon forgot. And in each cardboard palace, hot inside each borrowed suit of red, each Father Christmas pats the head of every child, drags out the lie; and so the holy days go by and fall beneath the pounds and pence that parents value more than sense. The harlot traders rub their hands and cheer the end of one more bloody year. In tinsel time the bells do chime and all rejoice and with one voice proclaim, disclaim, complain the lack of honesty in Santa's sack. The parties drag from pub to pub and end up at somebody's club and after, in the morning pain, the disenchanted mutter "not again" and stagger through another day but then, again, go out to play; Until, at last, the bells they cheer that start another bloody year. Kim James 12/12/95