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Fra Giovanni's Salutation (1513 AD)
As rendered by Boston's own Robert J. Lurtsema at the Christmas Revels at Sanders Theatre, Harvard University, 1978 (on Revels Records' album no. RC 1078) from Tasha Tudor's Take Joy: The Tasha Tudor Christmas Book (Cleveland: World Publishing Co.)
I salute you.
There is nothing I can give you which you have not,
No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in it today.
No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present instant.
The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet within our reach, is joy.
And so at this Christmastime,
but there is much that while I cannot give,
you can take.
Take heaven.
Take peace.
Take joy.
I greet you,
with the prayer
that for you,
now and forever,
the day breaks
and the shadows
flee away.