This morning, I have been looking for a Christmas poem for HopeMail’s Christmas card and came across this pretty poem. It really struck a cord in me. It’s not the right poem for HopeMail, but it does set my heart and mind on Christmas.

Helen Maria Williams lived from 1761 until 1829. She was born in London, but most of her life was lived in France. She was a political activist and supported the revolutionists. At one point she was imprisoned by Napoleon for her political writing, and I wonder if that is when she received this Christmas Cake. I don’t know who Mrs. K is, but she certainly chose her gift well—it inspired this lovely, sentimental verse.

To Mrs. K____, On Her Sending Me an English Christmas Plum-Cake at Paris

by Helen Maria Williams

What crowding thoughts around me wake,
What marvels in a Christmas-cake!
Ah say, what strange enchantment dwells
Enclosed within its odorous cells? 
Is there no small magician bound
Encrusted in its snowy round?
For magic surely lurks in this,
A cake that tells of vanished bliss;
A cake that conjures up to view
The early scenes, when life was new;
When memory knew no sorrows past,
And hope believed in joys that last! —
Mysterious cake, whose folds contain
Life’s calendar of bliss and pain
That speaks of friends for ever fled,
And wakes the tears I love to shed.
Oft shall I breathe her cherished name
From whose fair hand the offering came:
For she recalls the artless smile
Of nymphs that deck my native isle;
Of beauty that we love to trace,
Allied with tender, modest grace;
Of those who, while abroad they roam,
Retain each charm that gladdens home,
And whose dear friendships can impart
A Christmas banquet for the heart!