2025 Competition Entry:
A Trucemas Song by Stephen Greenberg
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Genre
Folk
Artist
Co-writer(s)
no
Performer(s)
Stephen Greenberg: guitar & vocals
Description
One morning in December 2023 I woke up having dreamed this song’s beginning: the basic melody of the verses, and a lyric line about winter’s chill hanging in the air. Then while out on a walk with my dog (when quite a bit of songwriting happens!) and the iPhone’s Voice Memo app open, I began filling it out.
Bio
Stephen Greenberg has been writing songs for 57 years — mostly in the closet, in the sense of never having a band or making a proper record. He was born in San Francisco and lived in the Bay Area, Santa Cruz (California), Germany, Italy, and Greece, before moving to the Sierra Nevada foothills in 1991. Married, two children, one grandchild, lots and lots of dogs. Mostly retired from work as an indigent criminal appellate defense attorney; before that, college lecturer.
Lyrics
December’s chill hangs in the air
and fallen leaves are everywhere
It all looks so familiar, you’ve seen this scene before
The gifts are wrapped, the carolers sing
the colored lights all twinkling
But Christmas doesn’t mean a thing, when half the world’s at war
The snows will fall, the winds will blow
with scented candles all aglow
It’s really quite a lovely show for those who live inside
The brand-new wind-up toys that shine
the warmth of sipping hot mulled wine
But Christmas isn’t so divine when homeless have to hide
The 1914 “Christmas in the Trenches”
a day of truce immortalized in song
It’s proof that we’re not forced to be so senseless
it shows we know just how to get along
So let’s flip the script that just one day is sacred
it’s all the other days and nights that call
If Christmas is as special as we make it
then let’s be in it for the longest haul
With Santa’s sleigh bells ringing out
and Christmas Muzak all about
You might not hear the future shout:
attention please, right now
So let’s let Christmas have its day
a harmless Hallmark-Card cliché
But the spirit of that holiday must rule the year somehow
I wish you a Merry Trucemas, beginning here and now
and fallen leaves are everywhere
It all looks so familiar, you’ve seen this scene before
The gifts are wrapped, the carolers sing
the colored lights all twinkling
But Christmas doesn’t mean a thing, when half the world’s at war
The snows will fall, the winds will blow
with scented candles all aglow
It’s really quite a lovely show for those who live inside
The brand-new wind-up toys that shine
the warmth of sipping hot mulled wine
But Christmas isn’t so divine when homeless have to hide
The 1914 “Christmas in the Trenches”
a day of truce immortalized in song
It’s proof that we’re not forced to be so senseless
it shows we know just how to get along
So let’s flip the script that just one day is sacred
it’s all the other days and nights that call
If Christmas is as special as we make it
then let’s be in it for the longest haul
With Santa’s sleigh bells ringing out
and Christmas Muzak all about
You might not hear the future shout:
attention please, right now
So let’s let Christmas have its day
a harmless Hallmark-Card cliché
But the spirit of that holiday must rule the year somehow
I wish you a Merry Trucemas, beginning here and now
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Note: the “‘Christmas in the Trenches’ … immortalized in song” refers to John McCutcheon’s classic anti-war ballad.