Winter Light began its life as a poem written by Angier Brock, a member of the congregation of Bruton Parish Church in Virginia USA whose choir director commissioned this piece. The poem’s powerful words portray the birth of Jesus as the light coming to banish the world’s darkness, a darkness which continues to loom large today in the form of ‘conflict, dread and new dangers.’ Ultimately it’s a message of hope because God’s ‘light still shines in the darkness’ to ‘guide us through the dark night’.