J.R.R. Tolkien*

J.R.R. Tolkien (1892―1973) is, of course, the author of the famous fantasy trilogy The Lord of the Rings. He was a respected philologist and scholar of Old and Middle English, who served as Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University.

His friendship with C.S. Lewis was of great significance to both of them — Tolkien influencing Lewis to embrace Christianity, and Lewis encouraging Tolkien through the revisions and publication of both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. They were among a group of significant writers and intellectuals playfully dubbed The Inklings — which also included Charles Williams, Owen Barfield, Neville Coghill and Hugo Dyson — who regularly met for chatter, drink, and frequent readings from their works-in-progress.

“Noel” was originally published in 1936 (the year before The Hobbit appeared) in The “Annual” of Our Lady’s School, Abingdon — and subsequently forgotten. It was only rescued from obscurity in 2013. It now appears in The Collected Poems of J.R.R. Tolkien (HarperCollins, 2024).

Noel

Grim was the world and grey last night:
The moon and stars were fled,
The hall was dark without song or light,
The fires were fallen dead.
The wind in the trees was like to the sea,
And over the mountains’ teeth
It whistled bitter-cold and free,
As a sword leapt from its sheath.

The lord of snows upreared his head;
His mantle long and pale
Upon the bitter blast was spread
And hung o’er hill and dale.
The world was blind,
the boughs were bent,
All ways and paths were wild:
Then the veil of cloud apart was rent,
And here was born a Child.

The ancient dome of heaven sheer
Was pricked with distant light;
A star came shining white and clear
Alone above the night.
In the dale of dark in that hour of birth
One voice on a sudden sang:
Then all the bells in Heaven and Earth
Together at midnight rang.

Mary sang in this world below:
They heard her song arise
O’er mist and over mountain snow
To the walls of Paradise,
And the tongue of many bells was stirred
in Heaven’s towers to ring
When the voice of mortal maid was heard,
That was mother of Heaven’s King.

Glad is the world and fair this night
With stars about its head,
And the hall is filled with laughter and light,
And fires are burning red.
The bells of Paradise now ring
With bells of Christendom,
And Gloria, Gloria we will sing
That God on earth is come.

*This is the second Kingdom Poets post about J.R.R. Tolkien: first post.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.

Luci Shaw*

Luci Shaw (1928—2025) is a pioneer poet of true artistry and Christian faith. The author of eighteen poetry collections and several other books. She passed away on December 1st at age 96. She was a dear friend, and a significant influence on my life.

How can I express the gratitude I have for Luci? One of the earliest poems I ever had published was accepted by Luci Shaw for Radix. I remember how thrilled I was later when she wrote an endorsement for my first full-length poetry collection, Poiema (2008). Next, I was further affirmed by this excellent poet when she accepted me as her editor for her poetry collection Scape (2013), which appeared as part of the Poiema Poetry Series. Perhaps the greatest honour she gave, was to ask me to write an endorsement for her for her eighteenth poetry book, An Incremental Life (Paraclete, 2025). I am clearly the one honoured by being asked to do this. The following is my endorsement as it appears in that book.

“For decades I have sat at Luci Shaw’s feet, listening to her lyrical wisdom, her playful music, her spiritual insight, and her deep connectedness to the natural world. In The Incremental Life, Luci Shaw shares her metapoetics ― choosing ‘words like matches, / striking them to see what happens next.’ As a nonagenarian, she acknowledges her shrinking life, yet invites us even into this experience. Still she wrestles with faith, and says to God, ‘Come, now. Fill / the gaps, mend the widening cracks in my aging /soul. I’m moving in your direction, but I move / more slowly, see more dimly, require more daily.’ As always, though, Luci Shaw is as wide-eyed as a child. ‘My heart,’ she writes, ‘is ambushed by simple beauty.’”

The following poem is from her collection, Accompanied by Angels: Poems of the Incarnation (Eerdmans, 2006), and is one she has granted permission for me to use in a forthcoming Christmas poetry anthology which I am planning for 2026.

A Blessing for the New Baby

Lightly as a falling star, immense, may you
drop into the body of the pure young girl like a seed
into its furrow, entering your narrow home under the
shadow of Gabriel’s feathers. May your flesh shape itself
within her, swelling her with shame and glory. May her
belly grow round as a small planet, a bowl of golden fruit.

When you suck in your first breath, and your loud
cries echo through the cave. (Blessings on you, little howler!),
may Mary adorn you with tears and caresses like
ribbons, her face glowing, a moon among stars. At her
breasts may you drink the milk of mortality that transforms
you, even more, into one of your own creatures.

And now, as the night of this world folds you in its
brutal frost (the barnyard smell strong as sin), and as
Joseph, weary with unwelcome and relief, his hands
bloody from your birth, spreads his thin cloak around you
both, we doubly bless you, Baby as you are acquainted
for the first time, with our grief.

*This is the fifth Kingdom Poets post about Luci Shaw: first post, second post, third post, fourth post.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.

Sally Thomas

Sally Thomas is a poet and a fiction writer, living in North Carolina. Besides her two poetry chapbooks, she has a first full-length collection, Motherland (2020), and another Among the Living which is forthcoming — both from Able Muse Press. She is an MFA Thesis Advisor at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, and has served in numerous capacities, such as on the advisory board of New Verse Review.

Her fiction primarily appears through Wiseblood Books — including the novel Works of Mercy (2020), and her recent story collection, The Blackbird and Other Stories (2024).

Together with Micah Mattix she edited the anthology Christian Poetry in America Since 1940 (Iron Pen/Paraclete Press, 2022). The following poem first appeared in First Things, and is from her forthcoming book, Among the Living (Able Muse Press).

First Sunday

In Advent, the hermit lights a candle-end,
Drips wax onto a saucer, stands it there.
The early nightfall forms itself around
This little shivering flame. He says his prayer:
Stir up Thy power, Lord. Outside, the wind
Has risen. Rain flicks its fingers at the window.
He’s alone. God’s called him to this homeland
Of loneliness, leafmold. The lengthening shadow
Creeps always from the trees. The winter air
Smells of it. At prayer he is God’s widow,
His heart bereaved and restless. Prepare, prepare—
The word exhorts him. The wet evening’s slow
Footfalls drag. He nods in candlelight,
Then darkness. So the watchman guards the night.

Posted with permission of the poet.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the author of six poetry collections including Angelicus (2021, Poiema/Cascade), plus three anthologies — available through Wipf & Stock. His new book The Role of the Moon, inspired by the Metaphysical Poets, is now available from Paraclete Press.