Monday, December 19, 2016

"Now They Are All on Their Knees"

This is my final posting this Advent. It is more of a Christmas poem, but not one you'll hear from the pulpit or recited in a Nativity pageant. 



The Oxen
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.
                                                                       by  Thomas Hardy

At some point in his illustrious career, this poet, to his regret, lost his faith. I often wonder why this happens to people and, if the loss saddens them, why they can't recover it? Hardy lived at a time when the Age of Enlightenment had massive sway over people's thinking. Suddenly there were explanations for everything, and humankind seemed almost supremely powerful. We had science. We had machines. People suffered in great numbers while barons of industry amassed wealth. Maybe this was just all too disheartening for him.

His novels, Tess of the D'Ubervilles and Jude the Obscure, in particular, show the failure of religion and, especially, the clergy. What gets people to where they must be in these stories is a grim determination for survival. When things end well, it is only a thin and meager wellness. 

Sp what prompted Hardy to write this poem of longing, of holiness that is just out of reach? Here he is ensconced in a comfortable pub with townspeople who recall the legend that at midnight on Christmas Eve, the animals worship the newborn Savior, yes, even in those modern times. Wherever they are, they fall on their knees, so great is their collective memory of that night of Nativity. All he would need is a word of encouragement to rush to the barn and see the oxen at prayer. Just one word. Which he does not get.

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