Christmas carols always tend to evoke thoughts of thoughts of the joy of the Christmas season, so I thought this always to be a joyful song from the first verse, which was all I knew until my second grade Christmas pageant. In that pageant, I played the third king, the one who sings these words of the fourth verse of the song. I was a bit taken aback as to why a Christmas carol, a song that so evokes the season to be jolly, would have these gloomy words. At the time though, I didn't trouble myself for long over it. I just assumed that, since Christmas IS the "season to be jolly" any song of the season WAS jolly, and these words must have some role in the overall meaning, however infathomable it seemed. As I grew up, I learned that the verses of the song trace other parts of the story of Jesus besices his nativity, and this verse covers his crucifixion and burial. Of the three gifts, myrrh is the one that the song most relates to a specific event in Jesus's life. But the song doesn't end on such a gloomy note; the fifth verse goes on to foresahadow Jesus's resurrection. And the chorus each time takes the setting back to the three Kings following the star.