Whose Holiday Is It?

Christmas lights flashing with such reverb
Before the first Thanksgiving Day turkey is even served

Newscasters pleading we need food and toys to help the poor
While stock market analysts make sales projections for the stores

Whose holiday is it anyway?
The poor and needy are with us everyday

Whatever it takes to make their consciences clearer
Food banks are running low and they need help to deliver

But whose holiday is it really?
People are shopping silly

There are 365 days in every year
For us to spread so much Yuletide cheer

The true meaning of Christmas got lost somewhere
Beneath the reindeer, red suit and white hair

Whose holiday is it actually?
Mass production is going on at all the toy factories

Yet amid the massive shopping hysteria and American Express
Many are still homeless, lost and depressed

Still living in cardboard boxes, under bridges, hungry and unemployed
For the true Christmas Holiday celebrates the birth of our Savior and Lord

He taught us to love our neighbors as well as ourselves
Not some North Pole location full of imaginary elves

It is better to give than to receive every day of the year
Not just in Yuletide season so I hear

When we can master always caring and being genuinely concerned
Then the true meaning of Christmas will be a lesson earnestly learned

Whose holiday is it ?

© c.f. leach, Time Out: Poetic Reflections.