Ponders the new he keeps concealed:
His bride-to-be in found with child—
A father’s name is not revealed.
As Joseph slumbers fitfully
An angel enters Joseph’s dream
To tell him that this comes from God
And things are not as they may seem:
“O, Joseph, banish all your fears
And take Young Mary as your wife
And be a father to God’s child
Who comes to share in human life.”
Good Joseph, born of David’s line
(Which matters not in days of Rome)
Bequeaths a human royalty
And gives the Boy a godly home.
A jealous Herod fears this King,
So Joseph takes them speedily
To Egypt, where again he works,
To care for his small family.
An angel tells that Herod’s dead,
So Joseph brings them all back home;
He brings them to quaint Nazareth
And raises God’s Son as his own.
---C. Marie Byars, 1999 (c)
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