The Editors of Dappled Things write:<\/strong><\/p>\n No matter your favorite Christmas theme or tradition, there\u2019s something for you in the Christmas 2008 issue of Dappled Things, now available online<\/a>.<\/p>\n Do you feel nostalgia for times you never knew when you think of the medieval boar hunt? Delight with feature author John Zmirak over God\u2019s gift of animals in \u201cNearer My Dogs to Thee<\/a>.\u201d Meet his hounds Franzi\u2014a \u201ccuddly, pokey Dog Lebowski\u201d\u2014and Susie, a \u201clean and elegant huntress\u201d who has a talent for, um, caroling:<\/p>\n [W]hen I say, \u201cSing!\u201d she lets out a long and poignant \u201cA-r-r-r-r-r-r-o-o-o-o-o!\u201d And then goes on doing it, sometimes for 30 minutes. Too bad it never occurred to me, back when she was a puppy, to invent a command for \u201cQuit it!\u201d Likewise, I was just so charmed by the way she\u2019d pounce like Tigger on every visitor\u2019s chest and climb up to lick his face, that I missed the chance to instill the signal for \u201cDown!\u201d Her breath reminds me of that summer in New Orleans when a friend spilled Vietnamese fish sauce in the car. But the look of fanatical love\u2014pure, absolute, and indiscriminate\u2014in those sharp brown eyes makes it hard to push her down: Like the angels gazing on the face of God, in one of Giotto\u2019s frescos. You learn to hold your breath.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Like a little more harmony in your holiday music? Prefer your breathtaking moments unscented? Your heart will be stirred by Rose Polchowne\u2019s hymn, \u201cChristus Natus Est<\/a>\u201d (subscribers only!):<\/p>\n Silence \u2018mid night\u2019s darkness rising, Wish you could spend the bleak midwinter basking in warm sun? Let Lauren Schott take you away to the fields of California in \u201cThe Strawberry Effect<\/a>\u201c:<\/p>\n A symphony of color hung in the skies above Nicholas Harris\u2019 head. The sun had exceeded even its own expectations that morning in producing resplendent reds and yellows. Black slated roofs and aluminum, accident-proof car tops obliterated the view for most people\u2014people who rushed to work or golf or home after an extended evening party\u2014but Harris had been awake for several hours already. . .<\/p><\/blockquote>\n We could go on, but this issue is so chock-full of delicious treats\u2014sparkling new poetry from a raft of talented authors including Michael Miller, Mike Schorsch, R.S. Mitchell, Gabriel Olearnik, Joseph O\u2019Brien, and Fiorella de Maria; a moving mystery play on the martyrdom of St. Agnes by Grace Andreacchi; and a meaty essay on Tolstoy by Dappled Things president Bernardo Aparicio\u2014that we\u2019d rather let you spend your reading time at www.dappledthings.org<\/a> or on the printed page. (And if you\u2019re not yet receiving the printed page, wouldn\u2019t a subscription<\/a>\u2014at only $20 for a full year of 4 issues\u2014be a fun and affordable way to ring in 2009?)<\/p>\n Wishing you a blessed remainder of the Christmas season and a happy, holy New Year<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Starlight falling.
Breathless all creation waiting,
One voice calling
At the crux of earth and heaven:
\u201cChristus natus est!\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n