Vocal Vision Awards

To a Poet a Thousand Years Hence by James Elroy Flecker

I who am dead a thousand years,
And wrote this sweet archaic song,
Send you my words for messengers
The way I shall not pass along.
I care not if you bridge the seas,
Or ride secure the cruel sky,
Or build consummate palaces
Of metal or of masonry.
But have you wine and music still,
And statues and a bright-eyed love,
And foolish thoughts of good and ill,
And prayers to them who sit above?
How shall we conquer? Like a wind
That falls at eve our fancies blow,
And old Mæonides the blind
Said it three thousand years ago.
O friend unseen, unborn, unknown,
Student of our sweet English tongue,
Read out my words at night, alone:
I was a poet, I was young.
Since I can never see your face,
And never shake you by the hand,
I send my soul through time and space
To greet you. You will understand.

Kiss Me Kate: So in love by Sam Spewack

Strange, dear, but true, dear
When I’m close to you, dear
The stars fill the skies
So in love with you am I
Even without you
My arms fold about you
You know, darling, why
So in love with you am I
In love with the night mysterious
The night when you first were there
In love with my joy delirious
When I knew that you could care
So taunt me and hurt me
Deceive me, desert me
I’m yours, still, my love
So in love, so in love
So in love with you, my love
So in love am I
So taunt me and hurt me
Deceive me, desert me
I’m yours, still, my love
So in love, so in love
So in love with you, my love
So in love am I

Emily (The Airborne Symphony) by Marc Blitzstein

At night a white-faced nineteen year old bombardier sits writing
The wonder of his crew tonight, before the fight, sits writing.
Behold the stern precision of time and plan,
Regard one sudden man in a given hour.
The hand, the eye, the deliberate brow,
This veteran now sits writing a letter home.
“I take my pen in hand, Emily,
To make you understand
What you are to me.
I write as far as ‘Dear Emily,’
And cannot make it clear
What you are to me.
You are my heart’s one cry.
Foolish words that I wish to say and try so terribly
The words are like a wall, Emily,
I cannot write at all
What you are to me.
You are my heart’s one cry,
If you were nearby you could tell me why,
So easily
Write me you will be true, Emily
Write me I am to you
What you are to me.”
At night a white-faced nineteen year old bombardier sits writing
The wonder of his crew tonight, before the fight, sits writing.

Four Whitman Songs: Come up from the fields, father by Walt Whitman

Come up from the fields, Father, here’s a letter from our Pete,
And come to the front door Mother, here’s a letter from thy dear son.
Lo, ’tis autumn,
Lo, where the trees, deeper green, yellower and redder,
Cool and sweeten Ohio’s villages with leaves fluttering in the moderate wind,
Where apples ripe in the orchards hang and grapes on the trellis’d vines,
Above all, lo, the sky so calm, so transparent after the rain, and with wondrous clouds,
Below too, all calm, all vital and beautiful, and the farm prospers well.
Down in the fields all prospers well,
But now from the fields come Father, come at the daughter’s call,
And come to the entry Mother, to the front door come right away.
Fast as she can she hurries, something ominous, her steps trembling,
She does not tarry to smooth her hair nor adjust her cap.
Open the envelope quickly,
O this is not our son’s writing, yet his name is sign’d,
O a strange hand writes for our dear son, O stricken mother’s soul!
All swims before her eyes, flashes with black, she catches the main words only;
Sentences broken, gunshot wound in the breast, cavalry skirmish, taken to hospital,
At present low, but will soon be better. Alas poor boy, he will never be better, (nor may-be needs
to be better, that brave and simple soul,)
While they stand at home at the door he is dead already,
The only son is dead.
But the mother needs to be better,
She with thin form presently dressed in black,
By day her meals untouch’d, then at night fitfully sleeping, often waking,
In the midnight waking, weeping, longing with one deep longing,
O that she might withdraw unnoticed, silent from life escape and withdraw,
To follow, to seek, to be with her dear dead son.

Street Scene: What good would the moon be? by Langston Hughes

I’ve looked in the windows at diamonds
They’re beautiful but they’re cold
I’ve seen Broadway stars in fur coats
That cost a fortune so I’m told
I guess I’d look nice in diamonds
And sables might add to my charms
But if someone I don’t care for should buy them
I’d rather have two loving arms!
What good would the moon be
Unless the right one shared its beams?
What good would dreams-come-true be
If love wasn’t in those dreams?
And a primrose path
What would be the fun
Of walking down a path like that
Without the right one?
What good would the night be
Unless thе right lips whisper low
Kiss me, oh darling, kiss me
Whilе evening stars still glow?
No, it won’t be a primrose path for me
No, it won’t be diamonds and gold
But maybe it will be
Someone who’ll love me
Someone who’ll love just me
To have and to hold!

Nuvoletta (extracted from Finnegan’s Wake) by James Joyce

Nuvoletta in her lightdress,
spunn of sisteen shimmers,
was looking down on them,
leaning over the bannistars
and listening all she childishly could. . . .
She was alone.
All her nubied companions
were asleeping with the squirrels. . . .
She tried all the winsome wonsome ways
he four winds had taught her.
She tossed her sfumastelliacinous hair
like la princesse de la Petite Bretagne
and she rounded her mignons arms
like Mrs. Cornwallis-West
and she smiled over herself
like the image of a pose of a daughter
of the Emerour of Irelande
and she sighed after herself
as were she born to bride with Tristus
Tristior Tristissimus.
But, sweet madonine, she might fair as well
have carried her daisy’s worth to Florida. . . .
Oh, how it was duusk!
From Vallee Maraia to Grasyaplainia,
dormimust echo!
A dew! Ah dew! It was so duusk
that the tears of night beagn to fall,
first by ones and twos,
then by threes and fours,
at last by fives and sixes of sevens,
for the tired ones were wecking,
as we weep now with them.
O! O! O! Par la pluie! . . .
Then Nuvoletta reflected for the last time
in her little long life
And she made up all her myriads
of drifting minds in one.
She cancelled all her engauzements.
She climbed over the bannistars;
she gave a childy cloudy cry:
Nuée! Nuée!
A lightdress fluttered
She was gone.

Mortal Storm: Genius Child by Langston Hughes

This is a song for the genius child.
Sing it softly, for the song is wild.
Sing it softly as ever you can —
Lest the song get out of hand.
Nobody loves a genius child.
Can you love an eagle,
Tame or wild?
Wild or tame,
Can you love a monster
Of frightening name?
Nobody loves a genius child.
Kill him — and let his soul run wild!

The Rake’s Progress: No word from Tom. . . by W.H. Auden and Chester Kallman

No word from Tom
Has love no voice, can love not keep
A Maytime vow in cities?
Fades it as the rose
Cut for a rich display?
Forgot! But no, to weep is not enough
He needs my help
Love hears, Love knows
Love answers him across the silent miles, and goes
Quietly, night
O find him and caress
And may thou quiet find
His heart, although it be unkind
Nor may its beat confess
Although I weep, although I weep, although I weep
It knows, it knows of loneliness
Guide me, O moon
Chastely when I depart
And warmly be the same
He watches without grief or shame
It cannot, cannot be thou art
A colder moon, a colder moon upon a colder heart
My father! Can I desert him
And his devotion for a love who has deserted me?
No, my father has strength of purpose
While Tom is weak and needs the comfort of a helping hand
O God, protect dear Tom, support my father, and strengthen my resolve
I go, I go to him
Love cannot falter
Cannot desert
Though it be shunned
Or be forgotten
Though it be hurt
If Love be love
It will not alter
Though it be shunned
Or be forgotten
Though it be hurt
If love be love
It will not alter
If love be love
If love be love
It will not alter
It will not alter
It will not alter
O should I see
My love in need
It shall not matter
It shall not matter
What he may be
I go, I go to him
Love cannot falter
Cannot desert
Cannot falter
Cannot desert
Cannot desert
Time cannot alter
Cannot, cannot, cannot alter
A loving heart
An ever-loving heart

The Negro Speaks of Rivers by Langston Hughes

I’ve known rivers:
I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the
flow of human blood in human veins.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.
I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.
I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.
I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln
went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy
bosom turn all golden in the sunset.
I’ve known rivers:
Ancient, dusky rivers.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
Love went a-riding over the earth,
On Pegasus he rode …
The flowers before him sprang to birth,
And the frozen rivers flowed.
Then all the youths and the maidens cried,
‘Stay here with us.’ ‘King of Kings.’
But Love said, ‘No! for the horse I ride,
For the horse I ride has wings.’

Love went a-riding by Mary E. Coleridge

Who are you dusky woman, so ancient hardly human,
With your woolly-white and turban’d head, and bare bony feet?
Why rising by the roadside here, do you the colors greet?
(‘Tis while our army lines Carolina’s sands and pines,
Forth from thy hovel door thou Ethiopia com’st to me,
As under doughty Sherman I march toward the sea.)
Me master years a hundred since from my parents sunder’d,
A little child, they caught me as the savage beast is caught,
Then hither me across the sea the cruel slaver brought.
No further does she say, but lingering all the day,
Her high-borne turban’d head she wags, and rolls her darkling eye,
And courtesies to the regiments, the guidons moving by.
What is it fateful woman, so blear, hardly human?
Why wag your head with turban bound, yellow, red, and green?
Are the things so strange and marvelous you see or have seen?

The Siren’s Call: The Return by Naveed Perkins

This pain, this love,
My heart, it hurts.
This pain, I yearn, I hurt.
O Sailor, my heart is crying for you.
A desire consumes me now without you here.
These waves, this ocean, all but myself calm.
What is this presence I feel?
No, do my eyes deceive me?
Oh, it is you, my Sailor,
Oh how I have missed you!
Oh how I have longed for your warmth,
For your touch, for your scent,
For your FLESH!

Five Millay Songs: Wild Swans by Edna St. Vincent Millay

I looked in my heart [while]1 the wild swans went over.
And what did I see I had not seen before?
Only a question less or a question more:
Nothing to match the flight of wild birds flying.
Tiresome heart, forever living and dying,
House without air, I leave you and lock your door.
Wild swans, come over the town, come over
The town again, trailing your legs and crying!

Mr. Tambourine Man: Postlude: Forever Young by Bob Dylan

…Though I know that evenin’s empire has returned into sand,
Vanished from my hand,
Left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping.
My weariness amazes me, I’m branded on my feet,
I have no one to meet
And the ancient empty street’s too dead for dreaming.
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me,
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to.
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me,
In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ you.
Take me on a trip upon your magic swirlin’ ship,
My senses have been stripped, my hands can’t feel to grip,
My toes too numb to step, wait only for my boot heels
To be wanderin’.
I’m ready to go anywhere, I’m ready…to fade
Into my own parade, cast your dancing spell my way,
I promise to go under it.
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me,
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to.
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me,
In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ you.
Though you might hear laughin’, spinnin’, swingin’ madly across the sun,
It’s not aimed at anyone, it’s just escapin’ on the run…
And if you hear vague traces of skippin’ reels of rhyme
To your tambourine in time, it’s just a ragged clown behind,
I wouldn’t pay it any mind, it’s just a shadow you’re
Seein’ that he’s chasing.
…Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free,
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands,
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves,
Let me forget about today until tomorrow.
…I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to…

Holy Sonnets of John Donne: Death be not proud by John Donne

Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for thou art not soe,
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill mee.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure; then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do goe,
Rest of their bones, and souls deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sickness dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well
And better than thy stroake; why swell’st thou then?
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

How to Get Heat Without Fire: How to get heat without fire by Marilyn Kallet

Beneath the dark floor
there has always been love,
but the trick is
how to get down to it?
Shall I tear my way down
like a tiger clawing
the floorboards, when this
tearing down is what scarred you?
Whose mother is there
in the dark trying hard
to hide you from the memory
of the floorboards in flame?
How to get heat without fire?
To coax light open?
To ease you new into
the world if I am not
a mother, or a beloved?
Pull back? Peel back dead
bark, pull back the boards
we trample, throw each other
down on and through some days?
Turn the floor into a pool
we can dive deep into,
cradle the mothers,
let the animals swim their ways?
Has music ever saved anyone?
Then I will reenter my life
as sound,
as notes strung like pearls
that you have yearned
to enter.
I will be sound,
I will be sound,
and silence,
listening.