Rooms of Light (1992)

Details

  • 12
  • SATB Choir

Program Notes

anna
               first dance

we walk from streetlight to streetlight
silence to silence
how to speak about the human heart and memory
how to speak about all the rooms we live in

rooms that were cloisters or rooms with lamps and seashells
and empty bottles
rooms with pianos or angels rooms where voices died rooms
that were dance-halls for wildflowers

rooms of prayer or despair rooms of light

memory is a scar I love to touch but will never trust
the future because I was born I trust and can never touch
so I straddle time taking the scraps memory offers and
wanting them again and again

               anna
               second dance

something about all the rooms I have inhabited

rooms with broken windows rooms of rain

the future, because I was born, I trust and can never touch. so
I straddle time, taking the scraps memory offers and wanting
them again and again.

seeking an end to memory

looking for other conversations in other rooms

          Text by Patrick Friesen