Description

Written in collaboration with Timothy Takach.

Voicing: SATB a cappella

duration: 3:15

Level: 3

This partner song featured poetry from legendary poets E. E. Cummings and Hafiz (in a beautiful translation by Daniel Ladinsky). Each song is complete on it’s own, but when they are put together something magical happens. This gem is a stand-out movement from the masterful larger work and is accessible even with its divisi.

Text

Even after all these years,
the Sun never says
to the Earth
“You owe Me.”
Look what happens—
with a Love
like that,
it lights
the whole
sky.

– Hafiz, trans. Ladinsky, “The Sun Never Says” from The Gift, copyright 1999 by Daniel Ladinsky, and used with permission.

yours is the light by which my spirit’s born:
yours is the darkness of my soul’s return
you are my sun, my moon, and all my stars.

– E. E. Cummings, “silently if, out of not knowable” from COMPLETE POEMS: 1904-1962, by E. E. Cummings, Edited by George J. Firmage, is used with the permission of Liveright Publishing Corporation. Copyright (c) 1963, 1991 by the Trustees for the E. E. Cummings Trust.