"Viewing Christmas Displays as a Family, Post-Divorce" by Micah Cozzens

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After Denise Levertov’s “Broken Ghazals”

Each house blinks

      into its own planet—star

of some holy wish, sparkle of— 

                                             some brittle need, to be

                                             cheerfully inflamed, to be

Not without longing

                               a thousand bulbs,

                                                            crooking a finger

Come here. You. Me. Together

                          While the batteries run down. 

I blink: in dark, I can almost imagine holy shadow

          covering my parents’ woven hands

but am corrected by headlights. They do not touch.

My Christmases, becoming adult

        thawing, strained affection 

in song: Silent Night, Awkward Night. 

            Do I want too much?

I survive

   but keep wondering— 

through the cul-de-sacs we see

   so much electricity.

Again wondering, I stretch a hand out

to condensate the window.

        Will the dazzled cold hold me?

Squinting toward light: 

 a lawn has filled it

with grinning diamonds. Or there’s the air, lewdly winking:

                                                                    newfallen snow. 

FM Christmas Radio

         I hear every year

compensates for quiet, and a glowing nativity 

                                    beckons: all the lights, dreaming of a viewer. 

They can keep me until spring. 

This piece was published in 2024 as part of the Holiday Lit Blitz by the Mormon Lit Lab. Sign up for our newsletter for future updates.