I've recently made this 16th century poem into a song, but then I hesitated to present it this week – because Robert Southwell's "The Burning Babe" seems both inappropriate and appropriate for Christmas.
Inappropriate because it's an intentionally harrowing, visionary poem. If what it describes was made into a film, its horror might ask it to be kept from children who are, after all, a central part of modern Christmas. And for whatever audience, at whatever level of understanding of Christian dogma that it expounds, it's a stretch to call "The Burning Babe" celebratory – and that's what we expect from Christmas.
This makes the case for appropriateness a difficult one – and, at least in the United States, it's not a common part of Christmas services. The poem's metaphysical religious point would be appropriate for Good Friday or Easter service, but the poem is set explicitly at Christmas. Perhaps, on a Christmas when many in our country (and elsewhere) are suffering during a celebratory time, the lines within "The Burning Babe" that speak of justice and mercy, or the possibly of defiled souls being refined and recast – even though these things happen post-anguish – may speak to some.
The Parlando Project takes various words (mostly literary poetry) and combines them with original music in differing styles. We've done over 850 of these combinaitons, and you can hear any of them and read about our encounters with the words at our blog and archives located at frankhudson.org
