Milton Acorn died in 1986, and a year after his death, some of the finest poets in Canada contributed to a collection to honour the hard life and vivid

personal and political poetry of Acorn; the collection was called The Northern Red Oak. Fred Cogswell contributed a poem to the missive called ‘When I Think of Christ’. The poem is worth the pondering. 

          When I think of Christ

          I think not of heaven’s king

          but of a neighbour 

          who died in the fire

          of his burning barn to save

          a too stubborn horse. 

Ron Dart