Book excerpt: The Advent season is filled with rich themes that have fascinated poets. In Run, Shepherds, Run, Bill Countryman presents a poem a day for devotional reading during Advent and the twelve days of Christmas. Readers will find classic poets they know and love, including George Herbert, John Donne, Christina Rossetti, Emily Dickinson, and Alfred, Lord Tennyson, as well as contemporary poets, known and unknown. Run, Shepherds, Run includes helpful hints for reading poetry, for those who have less experience reading it than others, as well as useful annotations to help readers with older language that may not have easily apparent meanings for today's readers.