Christmas haiku

Since it’s technically not an Advent haiku, I’m bending my own rules. The Peruvian crib scene is still my photo (from a museum in Cajamarca) but I’ve borrowed the backdrop from NASA. Happy Christmas to you all.

Image: Peruvian crib against starry night

Life’s light in darkness,
heaven’s heart come now to earth:
God nuzzling her breast.

Luke 2: 1-14 / John 1:1-14

Advent haiku – 4th Thursday

Things are coming to an end (which is rather the point of Advent). Today we’re onto the birth and naming of the forerunner, with a picture of the Judean desert on the Jordan border.

Image of desert

Name against custom
heralds desert harbinger
of love’s refreshing.

Luke 1:57-66

Advent haiku – 4th Tuesday

A bit of a problem when the Gospel turned out to be identical to the one that taxed my brain and image library on Sunday. But here’s today’s freshly minted non-identical twin.

Image: Stained glass window

Blood of her own blood,
forming unformed flesh within,
gives body to God.

Luke 1: 39-45

Advent haiku – 4th Sunday

Into the last stretch now, and definitely the hardest week to illustrate – especially since today’s gospel from the Sunday cycle turns up again in the weekday cycle on Tuesday!

Image – Statues of Mary and Elizabeth meeting

Rejoicing cousins
enrapt gossip their gospel:
bump to bump blessing.

Luke 1:39-45

Advent haiku – 3rd Saturday

And so the third week of Advent comes to a close, with a reflection on St. Joseph, fronting Matthew’s nativity narrative.

Image: tools in a workshop

Constrained by her choice,
he freely trusts, to become
guardian of God.

Matthew 1:18-24

Advent haiku – 3rd Friday

Today’s haiku – and I confess to a sense of relief that there’s only a week left. But now I won’t be able to use this picture for Christmas Day.

Image: Grotto of the Nativity

God, ungenerate,
gains genealogy, gives
Godself a strange home.

Matthew 1:1-17