Again at Christmas did we weave
⁠The holly round the Christmas hearth,
⁠The silent snow possess'd the earth,
And calmly fell our Christmas-eve;

The yule-clog sparkled keen with frost,
⁠No wing of wind the region swept,
⁠But over all things brooding slept
The quiet sense of something lost.

As in the winters left behind,
⁠Again our ancient games had place,
⁠The mimic pictures breathing grace,
And dance and song and hoodman-blind.

Who show'd a token of distress?
⁠No single tear, no type of pain:
⁠O sorrow, then can sorrow wane?
O grief, can grief be changed to less?