PAUL PADDOCK - "The Oxen"

paul paddock - chorale bass

"the oxen"

by John Rathbone

sung by Voces8

It's a little late for the season but I'm sharing this because of its calming and reminds me to have peace of mind in troubling/uncertain times. It evokes an intriguing and especially deep sense of sound poetry sculpted with Thomas Hardy's poetry in anticipation of good things to come.

'Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.
“Now they are all on their knees,”
An elder said as we sat in a flock
By the embers in hearthside ease.

We pictured the meek mild creatures where
They dwelt in their strawy pen,
Nor did it occur to one of us there
To doubt they were kneeling then.

So fair a fancy few would weave
In these years! Yet, I feel,
If someone said on Christmas Eve,
“Come; see the oxen kneel,

“In the lonely barton by yonder coomb
Our childhood used to know,”
I should go with him in the gloom,
Hoping it might be so.'