Wendy Butler

“I heard the bells on Christmas Day, Their old familiar carols play, And wild and sweet the words repeat Of peace on earth, goodwill to men.” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow penned these words on Christmas Day in 1864, after a long battle with grief. While Longfellow was a renowned academic, respected professor, and accomplished poet, he did not have an easy life. His first wife and child died as a result of complications from a miscarriage. After grieving this loss, he remarried and had six...