Corners
 

 

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Corners (Song cycle, texts by Emily Dickinson) Duration 12:17

 
i. A Soul Selects Her Own Society ii. A Loss Of Something Ever Felt I iii. Abraham To Kill Him iv. I Heard As If I Had No Ear v. To Die Without The Dying vi. I Should Not Dare To Be So Sad vii. Remembrance Has A Rear And A Front viii. The Props Assist The House ix. Lay This Laurel On The One x. Color, Caste, Denomination
0:00 1:02 2:36 4:03 4:55 6:00 6:52 7:50 10:25 12:08

 

i. The Soul Selects Her Own Society #303

 The Soul selects her own Society –
Then – shuts the Door –
To her divine Majority –
Present no more – 

Unmoved - she notes the Chariots – pausing
At her low Gate -
Unmoved - an Emperor be kneeling
Upon her Mat  -
 
I’ve known her-from an ample nation
Choose One -
Then close the Valves of her attention -
Like Stone.

ii. A Loss Of Something Ever Felt I #959

 A loss of something ever felt I –
The first that I cound recollect
Bereft I was – of what I knew not
Too young that any should suspect

 A Mourner walked among the children
I notwithstanding went about
As one bemoaning a Dominion
Itself the only Prince cast out –

 Elder, Today, a session wiser
And fainter, too, as Wiseness is –
I find myself still softly searching
For my Delinquent Features. 

And a Suspicion, like a Finger
Touches my Forehead now and then
That I am looking oppositely
For the site of the Kingdom of Heaven.

iii. Abraham To Kill Him #1317

 Abraham to kill him
Was distinctly told –
Isaac was an Urchin –
Abraham was old – 

Not a hesitation –
Abraham complied –
Flattered by Obeisance
Tyranny demurred –  

Isaac – to his children
Lived to tell the tale –
Moral – with a Mastiff
Manners may prevail.

iv. I Heard, As If I Had No Ear #1039

 I heard, as if I had no Ear
Until a Vital Word
Came all the way from Life to me
And then I knew I heard. 

I saw, as if my Eye were on
Another, till a Thing
And now I know ‘twas Light, because
It fitted then, came in. 

I dwelt, as if Myself were out,
My Body but within
Until a Might detected me
And set my kernel in. 

And Spirit turned unto the dust
“Old Friend, thou knowest me,”
And Time went out to tell the News
And met Eterni
ty.

v. To Die Without The Dying #1017

 To die – without the Dying
And live – without the Life
This is the hardest Miracle
Propounded to Belief.

 vi. I Should Not Dare To Be So Sad #1197

  should not dare to be so sad
So many Years again –
A  Load is first impossible
When we have put it down –

The Superhuman then withdraws
And we who never saw
The Giant at the other side
Begin to perish now.

 

vii. Remembrance Has A Rear And A Front #

 Remembrance has a Rear and a Front –
‘Tis something like a House –
It has a Garret also
For Refuse and a Mouse.


Besides the deepest Cellar
That ever Mason laid –
Look to it by its Fathoms
Ourselves be not pursued.

viii. The Props Assist The House #1142

 The Props assist the House
Until the House is built
And then the Props withdraw
And adequate, erect,

The House support itself
And cease to recollect
The Auger and the Carpenter –

Just such a retrospect
Hath the perfected Life –
A past of Plank and Nail
And slowness – then the Scaffold drop
Affirming it a Soul.

ix. Lay This Laurel On The One #1393

 Lay this Laurel on the One
Too intrinsic for Renown –
Laurel – veil your deathless tree –
Him you chasten, that is He!

 

x. Color – Caste -  Denomination #970

Color – Caste – Denomination –
These- are Time’s Affair –
Death’s diviner Classifying

D
oes not know that they are there –

As in sleep – All Hue forgotten –
Tenets – put aside –
Death’s large – Democratic fingers
Rub away the Brand –

If Circassian – He is careless –
If He put away
Chrysalis of Blonde – or Umber
Equal Butterfly – 

They emerge from His Obscuring –
What Time – knows so well –
Our minuter intuitions –
Deem implausible. 

 

Recorded: Lawrence University, Conservatory of Music, Appleton, Wisconsin, 2006 Karen Leigh-Post (mezzo-soprano)Barbara Boren (flute), Howard Niblock (oboe), David Bell (clarinet), James DeCoursey (horn)  Susan Lawrence McCardell (bassoon), Larry Darling (recording engineer)