For this second of December I’d like to share a contemporary poem with you. Like yesterday’s poem, this one by Maggie Smith is focused on darkness—on a darkness that presages a day. It’s not as gloomy as Hopkins’ poem, but it seems to me to have a similar idea at its heart, if framed differently. It’s dark now, yes, but a day is dark for a long time before there is any light. We can savour the darkness too.