The Boxer from the Bridge Over Troubled Water album by Simon & Garfunkel held special significance for me. My father had fought in the Golden Gloves amateur boxing competitions in Chicago in the '30's before I was born. He was 4' 11', so he was in the bantam weight division (actually, he was a feisty bantam his entire life). The song mirrors the history of my father's early life; his coming to America as a poor boy to seek his fortune, his loneliness, his fears and his poverty. It magnificently evokes the intense feeling of a boxer being alone with two other men in a boxing ring, one fiercely determined to physically defeat him, the other judging the performance of the two. It is quietly reminiscent of a long ago time with occasional, sensational moments of drama and incredible, quiet and echoey 'shots' (?), perhaps representing the punches of the boxers. Boxer will always be my favorite cut from the album and on my all-time greats list.
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