Redwings from Norway rattle at the clouds
But comfortless sneezers puddle in pubs.
The robin looks in at the kitchen window
But all care huddles to hearths and kettles.
The sun lobs one wet snowball feebly
Grim and blue
The dusk of the coombe
And the swamp woodland
Sinks with the wren.
See old lips go purple and old brows go paler.
The stiff crow drops in the midnight silence.
Sneezes grow coughs and coughs grow painful.
The vixen yells in the midnight garden.
You wake with the shakes and watch your breathing
Smoke in the moonlight – silent, silent.
Your anklebone
An almost cinematic image in the way it taps into primordial power of nature. 
 
 A vixen is a female fox– it seems that Hughes is playing on what is now the first thing we’d think of when we hear ‘vixen’, i.e., a ‘foxy lady’, starring, no doubt, in a Hollywood film. He tries to reclaim the word from cookie-cutter culture. 

Christmas Card