gemischter Chor (Living These Seasons)

Living These Seasons is a setting of four poems by the composer's sister, Sue Susman: The Hot Days of Summer, Against an Autumn Sky, This Winter Light and, Until the Spring Tress Come Back.

The Hot Days of Summer

At night stars sprinkle the darkness and

the moon with the sky in her arms

smiles gently and glows.

Everything around her is light.

Below all is green and silent.

Only the sound of crickets singing the night to sleep.

And we dream that a dragon stands at the window looking in

breathing in darkness

breathing out fire.

Even the wind feels like fire

breathing the dragon's breath.

And the moon holds the sky in her arms

in her arms, in her arms,

in her arms.

Against an Autumn Sky

The leaves are returning to earth now

little pieces of red and yellow

like tiny sails floating in air, but

the tree doesn’t move.

It is anchored, stuck, fixed in its place.

And the leaves fall, sails puffing outward, wind blowing harder.

They are dying again now, becoming thin and brown,

coming apart as they have before

twisting and lonely against an autumn sky.

This Winter Light

So cold, this winter light

even the sky is white

like breath exhaled, the sleeping breath of a whole city

turning into steam in the frozen air

becoming this white blanket that covers the ground.

Earth will rest underneath covered like a sleeping child.

And in the Spring, when the ice flows,

She will awaken, turning,

always turning, into something better, into something new.

Let my prayer for love be a lullaby that comforts more than me.

Make my song as hopeful as birds that sing, even now,

when there is so little light.

Until the Spring Trees Come Back

The gray sky wants to darken the daylight,

pulling down the darkness

like a dirty window that is always closed.

Earth is covered with snow,

the frozen ground hard as rock.

Then the sky opens and rain melts the ice,

until the spring trees come back,

their fullness even richer.

Flowers are growing,

a full palette of color in light.

Even the clouds look beautiful now,

white and floating,

changing in air.

Copyright material from Sue Susman reprinted with kind permission.

© 2008, 2009 Sue Susman