Cloud Anthem
Year
2020
Length
10'00"
Category
Choral
Orchestration
SATB chorus, flute, Bb clarinet, F horn, strings
Premiere
Premiere Delayed due to COVID-19
Program Note
Diversity is the backbone of our nation. Yet to be different does not necessitate being divided. Just as seemingly disparate swaths of fabric can be enjoined in the most beautiful patchwork quilt, so too can our hearts form a vibrant community fabric. And what is the alternative? To be scraps, littered separately on a cutting room floor?
Every once in a while, I read a poem that resonates so deeply, it makes my entire body quiver. Cloud Anthem by Richard Blanco, President Obama’s second inaugural poet, is one of those works. I’m incredibly grateful for his permission to set this poem to music and share its profound message. May we each follow its call to soften our hard edges and abide as one together in one single sky.
Text by Richard Blanco
Until we are clouds that tear like bread but
mend like bones. Until we weave each other
like silk sheets shrouding mountains, or bear
gales that shear us. Until we soften our hard
edges, free to become any shape imaginable:
a rose or an angel crafted by the breeze like
papier-maché or a lion or dragon like marble
chiseled by gusts. Until we scatter ourselves—
pebbles of grey puffs, but then band together
like stringed pearls. Until we learn to listen to
each other, as thunderous as opera or as soft
as a showered lullaby. Until we truly treasure
the sunset, lavish it in mauve, rust, and rose.
Until we have the courage to vanish like sails
into the horizon, or be at peace, anchored still.
Until we move without any measure, as vast
as continents or as petite as islands, floating
in an abyss of virtual blue we belong to. Until
we dance tango with the moon and comfort
the jealous stars, falling. Until we care enough
for the earth to bless it as morning fog. Until
we realize we're muddy as puddles, pristine
as lakes not yet clouds. Until we remember
we're born from rivers and dewdrops. Until
we are at ease to dissolve as wispy showers,
not always needing to clash like godly yells
of thunder. Until we believe lightning roots
are not our right to the ground. Though we
collude into storms that ravage, we can also
sprinkle ourselves like memories. Until we
tame the riot of our tornadoes, settle down
into a soft drizzle, into a daydream. Though
we may curse with hail, we can absolve with
snowflakes. We can die valiant as rainbows,
and hold light in our lucid bodies like blood.
We can decide to move boundlessly, without
creed or desire. Until we are clouds meshed
within clouds sharing a kingdom with no king,
a city with no walls, a country with no name,
a nation without any borders or claim. Until
we abide as one together in one single sky
From How to Love a Country: Poems by Richard Blanco
Copyright © 2019 by Richard Blanco
Reprinted by permission of Beacon Press, Boston
Performance History
- Premiere delayed due to COVID-19
