Poems of Gratitude: Verses to Prepare Us for Thanksgiving

“The Thanksgiving of Noah," circa 1700, by Giovanni Battista Gaulli. Traditional poems offer many ways to give thanks. Public Domain

As we celebrate Thanksgiving, Americans take time to reflect not only on what we are grateful for, but also on the importance of forming a habitual mindset of gratitude. To this end, I turn to three poets (two British and one American) for their insights on keeping this virtue before us always.

Though they lived through years of intense hardship and worldwide political turmoil, all three writers recognized that the present is always a gift, and goodness is present even amid intense darkness and evil. Not only can we be thankful through difficulty, but there is reason to be grateful even for hardship and loss.

The Gift of Life

“The Dream of Human Life,” circa 1533, by Michelangelo. Life is the most important gift to be thankful for. Public Domain

G.K. Chesterton’s (1874–1936) poem “The Great Minimum,” as the paradoxical title suggests, expresses that what seems the merest shade of a blessing is actually the greatest blessing of all. Each of the things for which he expresses gratitude is a sign of life, and we can’t take for granted the gift of being.

The casual statement “It is something,” which is repeated throughout the poem belies the magnitude of these blessings. To have felt deeply (even if that feeling is grief), to have experienced what no one else has experienced (even if it is a quiet moment of silence while others sleep), and to love (even if we love what is passing away) make up defining points in our lives, and our lives are inherently good. In fact, the speaker says that even if he were to lose the one he loves, it would still be worthwhile to have lived. He addresses the poem to one he loves, saying of this love that, “It were something, though you went from me today.”

The speaker is keenly aware of not only individual loss but also of the evil in the world at large. Even when surrounded by those who do not know the goodness of their own lives (“fatted lives that of their sweetness tire”) and when present “in a world of flying loves and fading lusts,” where no one else is steadfast in their affections, the speaker gives thanks all the more that he can be “sure of a desire.” Because of the vastness of the evil the speaker describes, the would-be small scale blessings he describes seem all the more miraculous.

The final stanza shifts from the understatement of the preceding stanzas to language of benediction. The ultimate good Chesterton names is the gift of life itself: “It is something to have been.” The minimum amount of goodness, then, is actually the greatest gift of all. Even with suffering and the evil in the world, darkness has not overpowered the light; it is good that we are.

Praising God

It does not naturally occur to us to give thanks for not having something. With loss, we have not only a frustrated desire, but we also feel grief and emptiness in a space which a beloved person or thing once occupied. Yet Stead’s (1926–2020) poem, “If everything is lost,” converts even this grief into a song of praise. In fact, if all he has is lost, he still has what is his all.

“Simeon’s Song of Praise," 1631, by Rembrandt. Giving praise to God is a good way to celebrate Thanksgiving. Public Domain

The poem sustains the paradox because, without God, the speaker has not even those things which he loses. He is left with only a farewell for what is passing away anyway. If he has God though, the source of all these good things, his love for these lesser things is only attached to them because God is in them. For this he bids them “God be with you” even when parted from the earthly beauty he loves. After the parting, he is left still with everything, for he has the Infinite One who is over all, through all, and in all.

Doing Good Work

“Going to Work,” circa 1851–53, by Jean-Francois Millet. Although work is hard, it can be very satisfying. Public Domain

C.S. Lewis (1898–1963) wrote frequently on the importance of living in the present and recognizing that what we have is a gift; in focusing on our desires and what we lack, we fail to receive what is offered to us in the present. In “The Screwtape Letters,” Lewis writes that “gratitude looks to the past and love to the present; fear, avarice, lust, and ambition look ahead.”

In his poem “In Praise of Solid People,” Lewis expresses the importance of being fully present, receiving what is offered to us by our mundane, everyday surroundings. He admires those people who are grateful for what they have, live simply, and have the virtue of humility. The speaker had formerly scorned such people for being simple-minded and too easily contented with small pleasures. He now realizes that they are the ones who have found genuine happiness. By contrast, the speaker feels “weariness and strife;” he is sunk in melancholy because he frets over all there is left to learn, the places yet to be traveled, and the sights yet to be seen. The most striking contrast is that he is alone, not rooted in a community of those “[r]ejoicing in each other’s praise,/ [r]espectable and innocent.”

The speaker’s desires are not evil in themselves; in fact, knowledge and travel are both good things to desire. However, the speaker allows his desires to keep him from living fully in the present. He dreams of far-off lands as he envisions:

And dusky galleys past me sail, Full freighted on a faerie sea; I hear the silken merchants hail Across the ringing waves to me

When he returns to the present, however, his dreaming has gained him nothing. He cannot escape from himself, and far from being harmless, his imaginings have lost him time (“The clock’s still ticking on the shelf”). Those who are not “fretted by desire,” who have worked hard and returned to their homes, do not find those homes empty and lonely, but warm and full of light. The speaker, “no nearer to the Light,” has not found happiness because he has not been led to God by gratitude.

Lewis writes in “Letters to Malcolm”: “Gratitude exclaims, very properly, ‘How good of God to give me this.’ Adoration says, ‘What must be the quality of that Being whose far-off and momentary coruscations are like this!’ One’s mind runs back up the sunbeam to the sun.” Unlike the speaker in the poem whose gaze is turned inwards to the contemplation of his own desires, one whose gaze is oriented by gratitude contemplates the source of his blessings, the light by which he enjoys the beauty around him.

In these three poems, we observe how gratitude is maintained throughout pain and hardship, in complete loss, and towards simple, everyday blessings. In every circumstance, the conscious decision to give thanks directs our thoughts to the source of whatever it is we are currently receiving. The primary function of gratitude, then, is that in seeing everything as a gift, our minds are turned outward to the giver. Our thoughts find their natural expression in praise, both of others and of the ultimate source of all goodness.

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