There is something comforting and cozy in the gentle wintry rhymes of Sheila Lynch-Benttinen’s “December Solstice”. A sense of community and tradition softly radiates from Sheila’s verse like candlelight. She explained the origins of her poem to The Dewdrop, stating, “This poem grew out of an annual event. The Minister of the 1681 Old Ship Church in Hingham, Massachusetts invites poetry and music in a nondenominational event every winter solstice evening.” Impressed by imagery and aesthetic, as all good writers, Sheila continued, “Imagine old wooden beams, soaring ceiling, candlelight, music, and a dark cold winter evening. I have attended for quite a few years, it is magic.”
December Solstice
we humans gather
near fire and candlelight
as if somehow huddled
we can shoo away the night
the evergreens are shivering
the winter stars are bright
on this, the dark
wondrous solstice night
all the ancient ones before us
gathered like we do
to tilt the earth back closer to the sun
and start the seasons anew
as we light the candles
on this blustery December night
remember this
we are all searching for the light
searching for the light
Sheila Lynch-Benttinen
Sheila Lynch-Benttinen sometime rhymes in her poetry, sometimes not. Sometimes she writes short Haikus, sometimes long epics. She does not believe in orthodoxy in poetry and only writes when the Muses visit. She feels a strong connection to nature, seasons, and the passage of time in her poetry. She has been published by seventeen journals and ten times by Haiku Universe. She resides in Massachusetts with her family and has degrees from U.Mass Amherst and Harvard University. She has worked in Boston for many years in a variety of occupations. She finds inspiration and collegiality from the Duxbury Free Library Poetry Circle.