The Light Come Down
Just a dusty country boy
Praying in the trees,
Knocked out flat and speechless,
Again up on his knees
And the light come down,
Lord, the light come down.
Sharper than suns he sweated in,
It slapped that April mud,
It withered the one that threatened him
And stunned him where he stood.
Yes, the light come down,
Lord, it did come down.
And he was just fourteen,
Mixed up, and read your book
And took you at your word
And asked—and Lord,
You let the light come down,
O Lord, a comin down.
Old Adam had a farmer’s son
And Abraham did too—
All made of mud but you made em good
And brought em home to you,
For the light come down,
It always did come down.
So Lord look down on country boys
That stink and puzzle and pray,
And strike the light to blind their sight
And make their night your day.
O let the light come down,
Yes, bring the light on down.
And bless you, Lord, for country boys,
Each hungry mother’s son
Treading the furrow his father plowed
Just like your single son
When you and him come down,
When you the light come down.
For Bread and Breath of Life
“Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that
the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.” (2 Cor. 4:10)
Our God who flamed within a tree
And spoke the law to shape our way,
We consecrate this hour to thee
And ask thy hearing as we pray.
Our Brother nailed upon a tree,
We eat and drink, and view thy death,
And live thy law in love, that we
May all be quickened by thy breath.
Bruce Jorgensen earned a BA cum laude in English at BYU and an MA and PhD in English and American Literature at Cornell. He taught literature and writing at BYU from 1975 to 2014, where his students included the poets Lisa Bickmore, Laura Hamblin, Lance Larsen, Danielle Dubrasky, and Scott Hatch.
About the poems
►Jorgensen wrote “The Light Come Down” in February 1976 in reply to Elder Boyd K. Packer’s BYU fireside address, “The Arts and the Spirit of the Lord”; he thanks his wife Donna for the word “dusty” in line 1 (much better than his first-draft word “dirty”). Of all he has published, this country song has shown the longest and strongest legs. It first appeared in Sunstone (vol. 4, no. 3 [1979]) and has been set to music by Benton Paul.
►Written later in 1976 and briefly considered by the church hymn committee, “For Bread and Breath of Life” was withdrawn when Jorgensen resisted changing “Our brother” to “O brother.” It was published in the March 1977 Ensign as a poem. In 1980 Dan Carter won the New Era hymn contest with a musical setting for the text (New Era, August 1980); more recently, Ramon Conrad Fuller published his musical setting of the poem in Hymns Today (Winter 2015).
About the hymn composers (click name to view hymn setting)
Ramon Conrad Fuller was born in 1930 in Murray, Utah. He holds degrees in Music Theory and Composition from BYU and a Doctorate from The University of Illinois at Champaign/Urbana. He taught music theory, composition and electronic music at the State University of New York at Buffalo and Indiana University at Bloomington. Many of Dr. Fuller’s earlier works were “avant-garde” electronic compositions. In his later years he has been inclined to more traditional forms, including choral and orchestral arrangements and the original hymn “For Bread and Breath of Life. He lives in Salt Lake City with his wife. They have two daughters, seven grandchildren, and five greatgrandchildren.
Daniel Carter was born and raised in Idaho, studied music in college, and served as the sheet music publisher and on the General Music Committee of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for many years until 2016. His hymns, children’s songs, and choral pieces, as well as his Christmas musical Artaban, the Other Wise Man, have moved congregations and audiences around the world for decades. danielcartermusic.com
