The Wild Flag (1943)
Context: This is the dream we had, asleep in our chair, thinking of Christmas in the lands of fir tree and pine, Christmas in lands of palm tree and vine, and of how the one great sky does for all places and all people.
After the third great war was over (this was a curious dream), there was no more than a handful of people left alive, and the earth was in ruins and the ruins were horrible to behold. The people, the survivors, decided to meet to talk over their problem and to make a lasting peace, which is the customary thing to make after a long and exhausting war. There were eighty-three countries, and each country sent a delegate to the convention. One English-man came, one Peruvian, one Ethiopian, one Frenchman, one Japanese, and so on, until every country was represented.
The Daisy, Stanza 1; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
The Storm is Over, The Land Hushes to Rest, l. 38-43.
Poetry
“my beerdrunk soul is sadder than all the dead christmas trees of the world.”
Source: Books, When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops? (2004)
Variant: Never worry about the size of your Christmas tree. In the eyes of children, they are all 30 feet tall
“You have more balls than a Christmas tree.”
“Christmas tree stands are the work of the devil and they want you dead.”
Source: I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America after Twenty Years Away
The Homes of England http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/hemans/records/homes.html, st. 1 (1828).
“If my Valentine you won't be,
I'll hang myself on your Christmas tree.”
Source: 88 Poems
