“And so the Shortest Day came and the year died And everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white world Came people singing, dancing, To drive the dark away. They lighted candles in the winter trees; They hung their homes with evergreen; They burned beseeching fires all night long To keep the year alive. And when the new year's sunshine blazed awake They shouted, revelling. Through all the frosty ages you can hear them Echoing behind us - listen! All the long echoes, sing the same delight, This Shortest Day, As promise wakens in the sleeping land: They carol, feast, give thanks, And dearly love their friends, And hope for peace. And now so do we, here, now, This year and every year.”  

—Susan Cooper, The Shortest Day

“The time draws near the birth of Christ The moon is hid; the night is still;
The Christmas bells from hill to hill Answer each other in the mist.

Ring out wild bells, to the wild sky, The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night: Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring, happy bells, across the snow;
The year is going, let him go; Ring out the false, ring in the true.”  

—Alfred Lord Tennyson, from A Grief at Christmas

“I heard a bird sing In the dark of December
A magical thing And sweet to remember.

‘We are nearer to Spring Than we were in September,’
I heard a bird sing In the dark of December.”

 — Oliver Herford, I Heard a Bird Sing