The Oxen - Christmas Poem
by Thomas Hardy

Miniature Biography

Thomas Hardy
Nationality - English
Lifespan - 1840 - 1928
Father - Stonemason
Education - Local School and apprenticed to an architect
Career - Poet, novelist, literary scholar, and architect

 

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A Christmas Carol poem

The Oxen - Christmas Poem by Thomas Hardy

Make it Snow !

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’


The Oxen - Christmas Poem by Thomas Hardy

'The Oxen' by Thomas Hardy