The painting was done in 1891 by Viggo Johansen and is entitled “Merry Christmas.”
The Oxen by Thomas Hardy
Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.
“Now they are all on their knees,”
An elder said as we sat in a flock
By the embers in hearthside ease.
We pictured the meek mild creatures where
They dwelt in their strawy pen,
Nor did it occur to one of us there
To doubt they were kneeling then.
Hardy was a Gemini with the Moon in Cancer and Leo Rising.
The Three Kings by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Three kings came riding from far away,
Melchior and Gaspar and Baltasar;
Three Wise Men out of the East were they,
And they travelled by night, and they slept by day,
For their guide was a beautiful, wonderful star.
Longfellow was a Pisces with the Moon in Scorpio. Mercury was conjoined with Pluto and trine Saturn.
In Memoriam by Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
Tennyson was a Leo with the Moon and Ascendant in Gemini.
On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity by John Milton
This is the month, and this is the happy morn,
Wherein the Son of Heav’n’s eternal King,
Of wedded Maid and Virgin Mother born,
Our great redemption from above did bring;
For so the holy sages once did sing,
That he our deadly forfeit should release,
And with his Father work with us a perpetual peace.
Milton was a Sagittarius with the Moon in Taurus and Mars in Pisces.
A Christmas Carol by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
“Then wisely is my soul elate,
That Strife should vanish, Battle cease:”
“I’m poor and of a low estate,
“The mother of the Prince of Peace.
Joy rises in me, like a summer’s morn:
“Peace, Peace on Earth, the Prince of Peace is born.”
Coleridge was a Libra with a Leo Moon and a Sagittarius Ascendant.
The Savior Must Have been a Docile Gentleman by Emily Dickinson
The Savior must have been
A docile Gentleman–
To come so far so cold a day
For little Fellowmen–
The road to Bethlehem
Since he and I were boys
Was leveled, but for that ‘twould be
A rugged Billion Miles.
Dickinson was a Sagittarius with the Moon in Libra and Scorpio Rising.
The Mystic’s Christmas by John Greenleaf Whittier
Keep while you need it, brothers mine,
With honest seal your Christmas sign,
But judge not him who every morn
Feels in his heart the Lord Christ born!
Whittier was a Sagittarius with the Moon in Cancer and a Capricorn Ascendant.
Christmas Trees by Robert Frost
He asked if I would sell my Christmas trees,
My woods—the young fir basalms like a place
Where houses are all churches and have spires.
I hadn’t thought of them as Christmas trees.
I doubt if I was tempted for a moment
To sell them off their feet to go in cars.
Frost was an Aries with the Moon in Cancer or Leo. Perhaps Capricorn Rises.
At Christmas by Edgar A. Guest
Man is ever in a struggle
There are days the worsts in him
is the master of the good,
But at Christmas kindness rules him
and he puts himself aside
And his petty hates are vanquished
and his heart is opened wide.
Guest was a Leo with the Moon in Cancer.
A Visit from St. Nicholas by Clement Moore
He had a broad face and a little round belly
That shook when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly.
He spoke not a word but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings; then turned with a jerk,
And laying his finger upside his nose,
And giving a nod up the chimney he rose;
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team he gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down on a thistle,
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
“Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night.”
Moore was a Cancer with his Moon in Leo.