Author: crstnlrsmusic

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Instrumentation: SAB chorus + piano
Duration: 3’00”
Poet: Clarissa Scott Delany

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Text:

Joy shakes me like the wind that lifts a sail,
Like the roistering wind
That laughs through stalwart pines.
It floods me like the sun
On rain-drenched trees
That flash with silver and green.

I abandon myself to joy—
I laugh—I sing.
Too long have I walked a desolate way,
Too long stumbled down a maze
Bewildered.

-Clarissa Scott Delany

This poem is in the public domain.

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Instrumentation: SSA chorus + acoustic guitar & piano
Duration: 3’56”
Poet: Emily Pauline Johnson

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Text:

And only where the forest fires have sped, 
  Scorching relentlessly the cool north lands,
A sweet wild flower lifts its purple head, 
And, like some gentle spirit sorrow-fed,
  It hides the scars with almost human hands.

And only to the heart that knows of grief,
  Of desolating fire, of human pain,
There comes some purifying sweet belief, 
Some fellow-feeling beautiful, if brief.
  And life revives, and blossoms once again.

-Emily Pauline Johnson

This poem is in the public domain.

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Instrumentation: TB or SA chorus + guitar (or piano)
Duration: 2’48”
Post: Alexander Posey

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Text:

In the dreamy silence
Of the afternoon, a
Cloth of gold is woven
Over wood and prairie;
And the jaybird, newly
Fallen from the heaven,
Scatters cordial greetings,
And the air is filled with
Scarlet leaves, that, dropping,
Rise again, as ever,
With a useless sigh for
Rest—and it is Autumn.

-Alexander Posey

This poem is in the public domain.

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Instrumentation: SATB chorus
Duration: 2’48”
Poet: Sara Teasdale

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Text:

I shall bury my weary Love
Beneath a tree,
In the forest tall and black
Where none can see.

I shall put no flowers at his head,
Nor stone at his feet,
For the mouth I loved so much
Was bittersweet.

I shall go no more to his grave,
For the woods are cold.
I shall gather as much of joy
As my hands can hold.

I shall stay all day in the sun
Where the wide winds blow,
But oh, I shall weep at night
When none will know.

-Sara Teasdale

This poem is in the public domain.

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Instrumentation: Soprano soloist + piano
Duration: 2’27”
Poet: Carl Sandburg

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Text:

Bend low again, night of summer stars.
So near you are, sky of summer stars,
So near, a long-arm man can pick off stars,
Pick off what he wants in the sky bowl,
So near you are, summer stars,
So near, strumming, strumming,
So lazy and hum-strumming.

-Carl Sandburg

This poem is in the public domain.