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4. Hymn
by Eavan Boland
Four a.m. December. A lamb would perish out there. The cutlery glitter of that sky has nothing in it I want to follow. Here is the star of my nativity; the nursery lamp in that suburb window, behind which is boiled glass, a bottle, and a baby all hisses like a kettle. The light goes out. The blackbird takes up his part. I wake by habit. I have it off by heart: these candles, and the altar and the psaltery of dawn. And in the dark as we slept the world was made flesh. You can find this poem in Outside History: Selected Poems 1980-1990.
