{
 "id": "george-macdonald/christmas-1884",
 "title": "Christmas, 1884",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "George MacDonald",
 "poet_slug": "george-macdonald",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Volume I",
 "book_slug": "poetical-works-vol-1",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 25,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1893,
  "venue": "The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Volume I (1893)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1893 collected Poetical Works, which is the printing this text is and not the poem's first appearance. MacDonald gathered and revised for it work published from 1855 onward, and it arranges the poems by its own editorial grouping rather than by the volumes they came from, so which earlier book or magazine printed this poem first has not been established here.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poeticalworks01macduoft",
   "https://archive.org/metadata/poeticalworks01macduoft",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9543"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/george-macdonald_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1953",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/8949",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9543",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9984",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10578",
   "https://archive.org/details/bookofstrifeinfo00macd",
   "https://archive.org/details/discipleandothe02macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/hiddenlifeandoth00macduoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/discipleandothe02macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/rampolli00macd",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/102955776",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/011821572"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 12,
  "n_stanzas": 3,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 39,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Though in my heart no Christmas glee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though my song-bird be dumb,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Jesus, it is enough for me",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That thou art come.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "What though the loved be scattered far,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Few at the board appear,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "In thee, O Lord, they gathered are,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And thou art here.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And if our hearts be low with lack,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They are not therefore numb;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Not always will thy day come back⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thyself will come!",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}