Kriss Kringle

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Just as the moon was fading
  Amid her misty rings,
And every stocking was stuffed
  With childhood’s precious things,

Old Kriss Kringle looked around,
  And saw on the elm-tree bough,
High hung, an oriole’s nest,
  Lonely and empty now.

“Quite a stocking,” he laughed,
  “Hung up there on a tree!
I didn’t suppose the birds
  Expected a present from me!”

Then old Kriss Kringle, who loves
  A joke as well as the best,
Dropped a handful of snowflakes
  Into the oriole’s empty nest.

© Thomas Bailey Aldrich