Christmas Poetry, Prose and Recordings Some says, that ever 'gainst that Season comes;
Wherein our Saviours Birth is celebrated,
The Bird of Dawning singeth all night long:
And then (they say) no Spirit can walk abroud,
The nights are wholesome, then no Planets strike,
No Fairy takes, nor Witch hath power to Charme:
So hallow'd, and so gracious is the time. Shakespeare
From Hamlet, Act. i scene i. Poetry / Prose / Carol Services / Recordings I wish to acknowledge the significant work done by the compilers of the Christmas Bookcase at Project Gutenberg, and by gbnewby who created the "XMas Collection" of works also found at Project Gutenberg. Last accessed May 17, 2007. Please visit and support Project Gutenberg
Christmas Poetry Note
1. All links open in a new window.
2. You can search for a title by using the [CTRL] + F combination. A A Ballade Of Old Loves - Carolyn Wells (MP3 / OGG) A Bedside Ditty - Algernon Charles Swinburne A Bell - Clinton Scollard A Carol for the Eve of St. Mary's Day - Thomas Evans (MP3 / OGG) A Carol from Flanders - Frederick Niven (MP3 / OGG) A Carol In The Pastures - Edward Bolton A Child's Song Of Christmas - Marjorie L. C. Pickthall (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Carol - Christian Burke (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Carol - Samuel T. Coleridge (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Carol - Aubrey De Vere (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Carol - From "The Pickwick Papers," Charles Dickens (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Carol - Longfellow (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Carol - James Russell Lowell (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Carol For Children - Martin Luther (MP3 / OGG) A Christemasse Game - Thomas Wright A Christmas Hymn - Anonymous (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Hymn - Alfred Dommett (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Hymn - Richard Watson Gilder (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Letter From Australia - Douglas Sladen (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Lullaby - John Addington Symonds (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas "Now" - George Wither A Christmas Song - William Cox Bennett (MP3 / OGG) A Christmas Song - Tudor Jenks (MP3 / OGG) A Cradle Song - William Blake A Cradle-Song Of The Virgin - Rev. H. R. Bramley A Defective Santa Claus - James Whitcomb Riley A Disputation Between Christ And The Human Form - Lawrence Housman (MP3 / OGG) A Hint To The Fanatics - "Poor Robin's Almanac," 1711 A Hymn For The Epiphany - Richard Crashaw A Hymn Of The Nativity - Richard Crashaw A Lulling Song - Isaac Watts A Merry Christmas - Frances Ridley Havergal (MP3 / OGG) A Plea For A Present - Ben Jonson A Rocking Hymn - George Wither A Soldier's Silent Night - James M. Schmidt, alt. A Song For A Christmas Tree - Louisa May Alcott A Song of Joy at Dawn - Catherine Winkworth A Spotless Rose - Catherine Winkworth An Invitation To The Revel - Anonymous An Offertory - Mary Mapes Dodge (MP3 / OGG) An Old English Christmas-tide - H. S. M. An Old Man's Christmas Morning - John Hartley And They Laid Him In A Manger - Edward Sherburne The Angel's Song - William Drummond Another Christmas - Rev. W. M. Bell The Approach of Christmas - John Gay At Bethlehem - Sir Edwin Arnold At Last - John Greenleaf Whittier At The End Of The Feast - Anonymous At The Sign Of The Christmas Tree - Pauline Frances Clamp B Ballade Of Christmas Ghosts - Andrew Lang Ban And Blessing - Anonymous The Beautiful Mother - Adapted from the Latin of Jacopone da Todi (MP3 / OGG) Beautiful Snow - John Whitaker Watson The Bells - Edgar Allan Poe Bells Across The Snows - Frances Ridley Havergal Beware Of Egg-Nog: An 1817 Warning! The Blooming Of The White Thorn - Edith Matilda Thomas (MP3 / OGG) Blow, Blow, Thou Winter Wind - William Shakespeare The Burning Babe - Robert Southwell By The Cradle-Side - William Blake C Carol - Anonymous Carol - William Canton The Child Jesus In The Garden - Anonymous (MP3 / OGG) Christ's Nativity - Henry Vaughan Christmas - Rose Terry Cooke Christmas - C. C. Cox Christmas - Phoebe Cary Christmas - George Herbert Christmas - J. E. Pauley Christmas Alms - Anonymous Christmas at Melrose - Leslie Pinckney Hill (MP3 / OGG) Christmas At Sea - Robert Louis Stevenson Christmas At The Round Table - John Hookham Frere Christmas Bells - Anonymous Christmas Bells - Longfellow (MP3 / OGG) Christmas Carol - James S. Park Christmas Carol - From The Neopolitan (MP3 / OGG) Christmas Comes But Once A Year - Thomas Miller Christmas Day - Samuel Rickards Christmas Day (For Dolly) - John Byrom Christmas Eve - Mathilde Blind Christmas Eve - Robert Browning The Christmas Holly - Eliza Cook Christmas Husbandly Fare - Thomas Tusser Christmas In 1875 - William Cullen Bryant Christmas In The Olden Time - Walter Scott Christmas Is Come - Virginia Almanack, 1765 Christmas Is Come - Albert Smith Christmas Minstrelsy - William Wordsworth Christmas Morning - Edward Moxon The Christmas of 1888 - John Greenleaf Whittier Christmas of Old - Thos. Kirchmaier Christmas Omnipresent - Leigh Hunt Christmas Past And Present - "Poor Robin's Almanac," 1739 Christmas Provender - Anonymous Christmas Roses - Lizzie Lawson and Robert Ellice Mack The Christmas Silence - Margaret Deland Christmas Song - Lydia A. C. Ward Christmas Sunshine - Anonymous Christmas Tide - Eliza Cook Christmas Time - John Clare Christmas Time - Eliza Cook Christmas Time Has Come Again - Anonymous Christmas Toys - Anonymous The Christmas Tree - Anonymous Christmas Trees - Robert Frost Christmas Verses - Teresa Brayton Christmas, His Masque - Ben Jonson Christmass Is Come And Every Hearth - John Clare Coventry Mysteries: Ludus_Coventriæ - The Mysteries Presented at Coventry on the Feast of Corpus Christi, Halliwell's Edition of 1841 Church Bells - John Keble Church-Decking At Christmas - William Wordsworth D The Death of the Old Year - Alfred, Lord Tennyson December - Harriet F. Blodgett December - Eliza Cook E The Earthly Paradise: Apology - William Morris The Epic - Alfred, Lord Tennyson The Eve Of Christmas - Alfred, Lord Tennyson THE EXAMINATION AND Tryal of Old Father Christmas - Josiah King F Fairy Faces - Anonymous The Faerie Queen - Edmund Spencer The_Fire_on_the_Hearth_in_Sleepy_Hollow - Edward Hopper The First Christmas Without My Mother - George Washington Doane The First Roman Christmas - Alfred H. Domett From Heaven Above To Earth I Come - Winkworth Translation of Martin Luther (MP3 / OGG) G Gates and Doors - Joyce Kilmer Gentle Men - W. M. Thackeray Given Back On Christmas Morn - Thomas Hood Glee And Solace - Anonymous God Bless Us Every One - James Whitcomb Riley Good-Night - H. S. M. The Good Old Times - "Poor Robin's Almanac," 1709 H Hail To The Lord's Anointed - James Montgomery Hang Up The Baby's Stocking - Emily Huntington Miller The Haughty Aspen - Nora Archibald Smith (MP3 / OGG) He Came All So Still - Anonymous (MP3 / OGG) His Mother's Joy - John White Chadwick The Holly Berry - Thomas Miller Holly Song - William Shakespeare The Holly Tree - Robert Southey The Holy Innocents - Laurence Housman The Holy Night - Elizabeth Barrett Browning (MP3 / OGG) The Holy Well - Anonymous How Like A Winter Hath My Absence Been - William Shakespeare Hush! My Dear - Isaac Watts Hymn For Christmas - Felicia Hemans Hymn For Christmas-Day - Jeremy Taylor Hymn For Christmas Day - Prudentius Hymn For The Epiphany - Prudentius Hymn For The Nativity - Edward Thring I I Cannot Tell - William Young Fullerton If Christmas Day On The Sunday Be - Anonymous Il Penseroso - Milton In Bethlehem - James Ryman It Was The Winter Wilde - John Milton
(The Hymn in On The Morning Of Christ's Nativity) K King Arthur's Waes-hael - Robert Stephen Hawker The King In The Cradle - From Byrd's Psalmes, Sonets, etc. King Olaf's Christmas - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow The Knighting Of The Sirloin Of Beef By Charles The Second - Anonymous L The Lamb - William Blake Labour's Reward - "Poor Robin's Almanac," 1728 Led By A Star - Joyce Kilmer Light In The Darkness - Norval Clyne The Little Gray Lamb - Archibald Beresford Sullivan (MP3 / OGG) Lord Thomas and Fair Ellinor - Child Ballad #73 Lordings, All Of You I Warn - Anonymous Lullaby In Bethlehem - Henry Howarth Bashford Ludus_Coventriæ - The Mysteries Presented at Coventry on the Feast of Corpus Christi, Halliwell's Edition of 1841 M The Magi - Y. B. Yeats (MP3 / OGG) The Mahogany Tree - William Makepeace Thackeray Maids, Get Up And Bake Your Pies - From the Bishoprick Garland, 1834 Mary's Baby - Shaemas O'Sheel Merry Christmas - Louisa May Alcott Merry Christmas, My Friend - James M. Schmidt Merry Souls - Anonymous Messiah - Alexander Pope Minstrels And Maids - William Morris The Mistletoe - Barry Cornwall The Mistletoe - "Fraser's Magazine," 1835 Mumming from "La Musa Madrigalesca" N Nativity - John Donne The Nativity - W. J. Blew Neighbors of the Christ Night - Nora Archibald Smith The News-Bearers - Samuel Taylor Coleridge November - Elizabeth Stoddard Now Christmas Comes 'Tis Fit That We - From "Poor Robin's Almanac," 1715 Now Enter Christmas Like A Man - From "Poor Robin's Almanac," 1701 O Ode To Winter - Thomas Campbell Of Christ's Birth In An Inn - Jeremy Taylor Of The Epiphany - Beaumont The Old Cap - Martin Parker Old Christmas - John Bridgeman Old Christmas Returned - Anonymous On Christmas - John Bampfylde On Lending a Punch-Bowl - Oliver Wendell Holmes On Love - Bliss Carman On Oaten Pipes - Anonymous On Saint John's Day - Anonymous On Shepherds' Pipes - William Drummond On The Morning of Christ's Nativity - John Milton On the Nativity of Christ - William Dunbar Out Of The Blossom Sprang A Thorn - English Traditional The Oxen - Thomas Hardy (MP3 / OGG) P Paradise Lost - John Milton The Peaceful Night - John Milton (MP3 / OGG) Pipe-Playing - Anonymous Praise of Christmas - Anonymous Provide For Christmas - From Poor Robin's Almanac, 1664 R Regrets - William Wordsworth (MP3 / OGG) Ring Out, Wild Bells - Alfred, Lord Tennyson (MP3 / OGG) S Saint John Baptist - William Drummond Santa Claus - Anonymous Sery - Richard Watson Gilder The Shepherds - Henry Vaughan The Shepherds In Judea - Mary Austin The Shepherd's Song - Drummond Signs of Christmas - Edwin Lees Sly Santa Claus - Mrs. C. S. Stone Son Of A Virgin - Laurence Housman Song Of The Holly - William Shakespeare The Song Of A Shepherd-Boy At Bethlehem - Josephine Preston Peabody (MP3 / OGG) The Sovereign - Martin Peerson The Star Bearer - Edmund Clarence Stedman (MP3 / OGG) The Star Of The East - Author Unknown The Story Of The Holly Sprig - Arthur Upson Summer Toil, And Winter Cheer - "Poor Robin's Almanac," 1724 Sung By The Shepherd - Anonymous T This Is Now Is The Winter Time - Goodwyn Barmby The Three Damsels - Algernon Charles Swinburne The Three Kings - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow To A Lady - Thomas William Parsons To An Old Fogey - Sir Owen Seaman Thrice Welcome! - Anonymous The Trencherman - Anonymous Tryste Noel - Louise Imogen Guiney (MP3 / OGG) Twelfth Night - William Shakespeare The Two Advents - George Washington Doane U Under The Holly Bough - Charles MacKay V The Virgin Mary - Laurence Housman The Virgin Mary To The Child Jesus - Elizabeth Barrett Browning The Virgin's Cradle-Hymn - Samuel Taylor Coleridge W The Waits - Margaret Deland Wassail - "Ainsworth's Magazine," 1848 Wassailing Song - From Bullen, A Christmas Garland Welcome, Friend! St Nicholas, Welcome - From "The Festival Of St. Nicholas," Mary Mapes Dodge When Skies Were Blue - From Bullen, A Christmas Garland While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks By Night - Margaret Deland Whispering Palms - Lope de Vega Winter - William Shakespeare Winter's Delights - Thomas Campion The Wise Men Of The East - A. Mary F. Robinson Wreaths - Carolyn Hillman Other Christmas Poetry A Visit from St. Nicholas - Attributed to Clement Clarke Moore (Text)
Read by Douglas Anderson: MP3 / OGG Illustrations by Jessie Wilcox Smith:
Twas The Night Before Christmas, by Clement C. Moore.
Illustrations by F.O.C. Darley:
A Visit From Saint Nicholas, by Clement C. Moore.
Christmas Poetry From Robert Herrick A Christmas Carol (First Line: "What sweeter music can we bring")
A Hymn To The Lares - Robert Herrick A New Year's Gift - Robert Herrick An Ode Of The Birth Of Our Saviour - Robert Herrick The Bell-Man - Robert Herrick
On Christmas Eve (Come Bring The Noise)
On Christmas Eve (Come, Guard This Night)
Christmas Eve: Come, Guard This Night the Christmas Pie
Candlemas Eve (Down With The Rosemary, And So)
Candlemas Eve (Down With The Rosemary and Bays)
Candlemas Eve Carol
Candlemas Day (Kindle The Christmas Brand)
Give Way, Give Way, Ye Gates, And Win (A Wassail)
Tell Us, Thou Cleere And Heavenly Tongue (Also known as The Star Song) True Hospitality - Robert Herrick Twelfth Night, or King and Queen (Now, Now, The Mirth Comes)
Saint Distaff's Day (Partly Work and Partly Play)
The Wassail - Robert Herrick The Wassail Bowl - Robert Herrick See also: Christmas Customs from Hesperides by Robert Herrick
Ceremonies For Christmas
(From Bullen: Another To The Maids and Another)
The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick Christmas Poetry From Eugene Field Christmas Tales and Christmas Verse - Eugene Field
Plus Bethlehem-Town - Eugene Field Christmas Eve - Eugene Field Christmas Hymn - Eugene Field Christmas Morning - Eugene Field Chrystmasse Of Olde - Eugene Field Jest 'Fore Christmas - Eugene Field Star Of The East - Eugene Field The Three Kings Of Cologne - Eugene Field See Also A Little Book of Profitable Tales - Eugene Field (Prose) Christmas Poetry of Eugene Field
Opens in a new window at an external site. Christmas Poetry from Gilbert Keith (G. K.) Chesterton A Christmas Carol - G. K. Chesterton (MP3 / OGG) The Feast In The Snow - G. K. Chesterton Gold Leaves - G. K. Chesterton The House of Christmas - Gilbert Keith Chesterton The Wise Men - G. K. Chesterton Christmas Poetry from Anne P. L. Field A Christmas Insurrection - Anne P. L. Field (MP3 / OGG) A Prayer At Bethlehem - Anne P. L. Field (MP3 / OGG) The Christmas Fires - Anne P. L. Field (MP3 / OGG) The Night After Christmas - Anne P. L. Field When The Stars Of Morning Sang - Anne P. L. Field Excerpts from "Christmas" by Romaine Joseph Thorne
Christmas Eve The Christmas Carol Christmas Sports Evergreen-Decking At Christmas The Christmas Box The Christmas Feast Christmas Poetry by Henry Van Dyke A Ballad Of Santa Clause Christmas Tears To The Child Jesus The Foolish Fir-Tree Harold Macdonald's - poems from the eighth decade
Poems, Carols and Other Writings
Opens in a new window at an external site. Narrative Poetry for Advent by John Piper
Opens in a new window at an external site. Christmas Poetry by Agatha Weeks: Keep Christ In Christmas - New Twas The Night Before Christmas Silver Bells and Golden Memories New For 2007 - Christmas Memories
Copyright: Agatha Weeks.
Reproduced with the kind permission of the author.
Opens in a new window at an external site. Other Poetry Collections Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of England - Robert Bell (1857) (Text) Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of the Peasantry of England - Robert Bell (PDF) Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of the Peasantry of England - James Henry Dixon (alt.) Harrison S. Morris
In The Yule-Log Glow, Book 3, Christmas Poems From 'Round The World.
In The Yule-Log Glow, Book 4, Christmas Poems From 'Round The World. Mr. Morris also edited two volumes of Christmas Prose; see below. Collections of Christmas Poetry Poems of Christmas by Katherine Lee Bates Christmas-tide Poetry of Emily Elizabeth Steele Elliott Father Andrew's Carols And Christmas Rhymes Christmas-tide Poetry of John Keble Christmastide Poems of Christina Rossetti Christmas Poetry of Catherine Winkworth Advertisement Top
Why do the bells of Christmas ring?
Why do little children sing?
Once a lovely shining star,
Seen by shepherds from afar,
Gently moved until its light
Made a manger's cradle bright.
There a darling baby lay,
Pillowed soft upon the hay;
And its mother sung and smiled:
"This is Christ, the holy Child!"
Therefore bells for Christmas ring,
Therefore little children sing. — Eugene Field, Christmas Tales and Christmas Verse
Christmas Prose Note
1. All links open in a new window. 2. You can search for a title by using the [CTRL] + F combination. A A Christmas Garland - Max Beerbohm A Christmas Mumming, 1377 A Christmas Mystery - William J Locke A Christmas Sermon - Robert Louis Stevenson A Christmas Story - Dr. Samuel W. Francis A Little Book for Christmas - Cyrus Townsend Brady A Little Book of Profitable Tales - Eugene Field A Napa Christchild - Charles A. Gunnison A Reversible Santa Claus - Meredith Nicholson A Versailles Christmas-Tide - Mary Stuart Boyd A Wonderful Night-An Interpretation Of Christmas - James H Snowden An Ordinance For The Better Observation Of The Feast Of The Nativity Of Christ - Parliament, 1644 And Thus He Came - Cyrus Townsend Brady The Arraignment, Conviction, and Imprisonment Of Christmas - 1645 As We Were Saying - Charles Dudley Warner B Beasley's Christmas Party - Booth Tarkington Becky's Christmas Dream - Louisa May Alcott Betty's Bright Idea - Harriet Beecher Stowe The Birds' Christmas Carol - Kate Douglas Wiggin The Blossoming Rod - Mary Stewart Cutting The Burglar and the Blizzard - Alice Duer Miller The Burial of the Guns - Thomas Nelson Page By the Christmas Fire - Samuel McChord Crothers C Campfire Girls in the Allegheny Mountains - Stella M. Francis The Children's Book of Christmas Stories - Edited by Asa Don Dickinson and Ada M Skinner Christian Gellert's Last Christmas - Berthold Auerbach Christmas - Zona Gale Christmas, A Happy Time - Alicia Catherine Mant The Christmas Angel - Abbie Farwell Brown The Christmas Banquet - Nathaniel Hawthorne The Christmas Books - W M Thackeray The Christmas Child - Hesba Stretton Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Luke Limner Christmas Entertainments - Alice Maude Kellogg Christmas Eve on Lonesome and Other Stories - John Fox Jr Christmas Every Day - William Dean Howells (LV2006) Christmas Every Day, and Other Stories - W. D. Howells Christmas Holidays at Merryvale - Alice Hale Burnett Christmas in Legend and Story - Elva S. Smith The Christmas Kalends of Provence - Thomas A. Janvier The Christmas Miracle - Charles Egbert Craddock The Christmas Peace - Thomas Nelson Page Christmas Outside of Eden - Coningsby Dawson Christmas Tales and Christmas Verse - Eugene Field Christmas with Grandma Elsie - Martha Finley Christmas, His Masque - Ben Jonson Colonel Crockett's Co-operative Christmas - Rupert Hughes The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar (LV2006) Corporal Sam and Other Stories - A T Quiller-Couch E Evenings at Donaldson Manor - Maria J. McIntosh. THE EXAMINATION AND Tryal of Old Father Christmas - Josiah King F The Feast of St Friend - Arnold Bennett Frenzied Fiction by Stephen Leacock (LV2006) G The Goblins' Christmas - Elizabeth Anderson H Heretics - G K Chesterton I I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales - Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch L Lill's Travels in Santa Claus Land and other Stories - Ellis Towne, Sophie May and Ella Farman Literary Lapses by Stephen Leacock (LV2006) The Little City Of Hope - F Marion Crawford Little Maid Marian - Amy E. Blanchard. M The Moving Finger - Mary Gaunt Mr. Jack Hamlin's Mediation - Bret Harte Mr. Kris Kringle - S. Weir Mitchell Mrs. Budlongs Chrismas Presents - Rupert Hughes Mrs. Skagg's Husbands and Other Stories by Bret Harte (LV2006) N Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays - Annie Roe Carr Nibsy's Christmas - Jacob A. Riis O The Old Peabody Pew - Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin | 
