On the Trunks of Strong Trees (low voice)

for Baritione or Alto Voice,Flute, Piano and Cello

Premiered February 15, 2006, by Vanessa Rose Ament, soprano, Jessica Andrews, piano, Samantha
Bosch, flute, and Tracy Hagen, cello, on the Pleasure for the Ear concert at Bethany Lutheran Church.

After dinner when the refrigerator droned monotone commentary,
To supplant the fan overhead,
Holding onto the railing she fled
Down ten flights of orange-railed stairs and outside
Into the evening drizzle and the ionized air
In no state of mind to be fair
To the crisp calmness which spoke for the world
With lingering light in the sky and windshield wipers in gear,
Singing to counteract fear,
And everything else that weighed down
Ten floors up in the kitchen
When thirty-two seemed too old
To lose direction without losing hold
On a peace that no longer believed itself
Any better than boredom.
So she let herself slow down
And accept the strength that she found
From lashing her tears on the trunks of strong trees,
Sucking in the scent of wet earth,
Staring at the coarse cold bark,
Believing in the thunder and the dark.