Our Waking Souls
SATB divisi, piano | Duration c. 6'00”
Hewitt Hill Music
Our Waking Souls was commissioned by the Northern Michigan University Arts Chorale, conducted by Dr. Erin Colwitz, and premiered at the ACDA Michigan Fall Conference in 2018. This festival-appropriate work sets the final two stanzas from John Donne’s 17th Century poem “The Good-Morrow.” Though this poem was originally themed on the subject of romantic love, I feel that the images used by Donne speak to broader themes of unity, tolerance and respect. By making slight alterations to the text, some of which were necessary to modernize the language, I was able to construct a piece that addresses the issues of division that are so prevalent in our world today, and that strives for the hope of a better tomorrow.
And now good-morrow to our waking souls,
Which watch not one another out of fear;
For love, all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone,
Let maps to other worlds on worlds have shown,
Let us possess one world, each hath one, and is one.
My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,
And true plain hearts do in our faces rest;
Where can we find two better hemispheres,
Without sharp north, without declining west?
Whatever dies, was not equal;
If our two loves be one, or, thou and I
Love so alike, that none can fade, none can die.
- John Donne, adapted by Thomas LaVoy