Letter to a Lover, From a Mama's Boy

[egr]

The Christmas tree is glowing with a headache-causing hue. "headache-causing hue" is clunky; I suppose you were going for alliteration on the Hs? nauseating would work better, or something entirely different since that's a bit familiar
The cookies have way too much cinnamon. this line needs MORE cinnamon cause right now it's pretty dull. Say it out loud to yourself.
And every time aunt Lisa laughs I feel like I will die; "I will" would sound a lot better as "I'll"
her voice, to me, is a carcinogen. "to me"? We know it's to the speaker because he's telling us so. Again, this is thrown in simply to make the pattern complete. Ouch.

For me, this is the only workable stanza. Too many of the other lines add nothing. The language is generally prosaic; as Todd aptly put it, "basic".

Now, that being said, I think you have a great start with this stanza and the general idea of holiday angst. I'd like to see you incorporate the dig at Lisa ("her, not you"). I also want the mama's boy motif to either take on a bigger role in the poem or be removed. You have it in the title and last line, but it seems random in context. Sounds more like issues with Aunt Lisa than lover and mama combined.

For me the main issue is that you've forced yourself to rhyme in a strange meter (which, by the way, fell apart completely in the last stanza), resulting in some super awkward syntax and bland filler to accommodate. I'd scratch one or the other (rhyme or meter) or BOTH for now, until you can really make it sing like a Christmas carol.  cinnamon/carcinogen is really interesting and unexpected, so if you do stick with rhyme, keep those in mind.

I'd like to see you take this further, adding more concrete imagery as in the second stanza. Good luck! EGR