Baroque sheep dance.

I went out to check the sheep late last night after hearing the neighbors dogs barking and they were just having a great time bouncing around in the snow.  They had already been fed but seeing me were begging for more so I threw in a couple more pats of hay.  I have a spot light that hangs off the sheepshed.  It lights their little holding paddock. I can see them very well with the added lighting.  I keep that light on to keep coyotes away and so I can spot check for lambs with ease.  The ewes were in a gleeful mood and were banging heads and jumping in the air all the while snow swirled around them and glittered on their backs and faces.  It was like a Baroque sheep dance.  Seldom do they stay inside their little fold at the end of the shed. They enjoy the cold crisp weather. I think the neighbors dogs were probably barking at the yellow cat that just showed up here last month and hangs around the barn. This is the kind of winter weather I like best.  Snow but not too much and lovely crisp nights.

A poem by Richard Francis Burton (1821 - 1890 / England)

Black Sheep

FROM their folded mates they wander far,
Their ways seem harsh and wild:
They follow the beck of a baleful star,
Their paths are dream-beguiled.

Yet haply they sought but a wider range,
Some loftier mountain slope,
And little recked of the country strange
Beyond the gates of hope.

And haply a bell with a luring call
Summoned their feet to tread
Midst the cruel rocks, where the deep pitfall
And the lurking snare are spread.

Maybe, in spite of their tameless days
Of outcast liberty,
They ’re sick at heart for the homely ways
Where their gathered brothers be.

And oft at night, when the plains fall dark
And the hills loom large and dim,
For the shepherd’s voice they mutely hark,
And their souls go out to him.

Meanwhile, “Black sheep! black sheep!” we cry,
Safe in the inner fold;
And maybe they hear, and wonder why,
And marvel, out in the cold.

Richard Francis Burton