Alex Gray: ‘A Christmas Samaritan’

A Christmas Samaritan: A Festive Tale in Verse

By Scottish author Alex Gray

 

(Originally published in Life and Work magazine)

 

It wis Christmas week and the shops were thrang

wi’ folk buyin’ gifts the whole day lang.

The toy shop wis doin’ a richt roarin’ trade

and the gaffer wis pleased at the profit he’d made!

 

Wee Jeannie stood out in the cold and the rain,

her nose right up tae the shop’s window pane,

and she gazed at the toys so new and so bright

at every conceivable thing to delight.

 

There were robots and Lego and cuddly toys,

dollies for girls and pop guns for boys,

dart boards, train sets, remote-controlled cars,

footballs, Meccano and monsters from Mars.

 

But wee Jeannie sighed at the best of them all:

all shiny and tinselly – a real fairy doll.

Aye, Jeannie might sigh for a dolly like yon

There’d be nae presents for her on Christmas morn.

 

Wi’ her dad in the jyle and six others tae feed

Jeannie’s maw wis hard pit tae afford jam and breid.

Her washed-out wee frock was all shades of greys

and her hand-me-down shoes had seen better days.

 

A man and a wumman breenged intae the store

they’d bought plenty already but still wanted more.

Stocking fillers and trinkets and all sorts of stuff.

If their weans didnae get them they’d go in the huff.

 

A Sunday school teacher was next in the shop;

She didn’t see Jeannie – she’d nae time tae stop.

A long list of names she held in her hand

of the children whose grand Christmas party she’d planned.

 

Then out of the gloom came auld Sadie Brown,

An old widow wumman, shopping in town.

She liked tae look at the toys now and then

though her grand weans were all grown wummen and men.

 

She saw Jeannie’s face all squashed up tae the glass

and she thocht in her heart, ‘Och, the puir little lass

she shouldnae be out in the streets all alane

wi’ hardly a stitch tae keep out the rain.’

 

Then Sadie she thocht o’anither wee child,

the one that they said was so meek and mild;

a bairn so good, so true and so kind . . .

thinking of Him Sadie made up her mind.

 

The shopkeeper lifted the fairy away

and Jeannie’s wee face was filled with dismay.

but before her eyes could shed even a tear

she heard, ‘Here’s a wee present for you, my dear.’

 

An auld wifie smiled as she gave her the doll.

Wee Jeannie could hardly believe it at all.

She’d treasure it dearly, this moment for ever,

a real Christmas feeling, a gift from a giver.

 

Click here to find out more about Alex Gray’s latest Glasgow-set crime novel, The Swedish Girl