A sinister Christmas poem.

By Charles Causley, an interesting and under-rated poet - possibly because he wrote so deceptively simply. In Britain, he's probably known best for his poem about a neglected child ("Timothy Winters comes to school/ With eyes as wide as a football pool.") A lot of his poems have a religious theme - ("I am the great sun, but you do not see me") - though like RS Thomas, they seem to oscillate between hope, anger and despair. He also has a tremendously strong sense of place, particularly with regard to his native Cornwall. Auden reported that Causley was given to saying that "while there are some good poems which are only for adults, because they pre-suppose adult experience in their readers, there are no good poems which are only for children." This seems to me to be dead right (it's true of books and music, too).

Anyway, the poem, which has been recorded in a spine-chilling version by the Yorkshire folk collective Coope, Boyes and Simpson is under the cut:

( Watch where he comes walking/ Out of the Christmas flame )