Radical Light
Don Freund
About this work:
Don Freund's Radical Light is one of a set of orchestral movements entitled Poem Symphonies. Each symphony is inspired by the work of a contemporary American poet. The symphonies are not attempts to set poetry to music, but rather each proceeds from a poem, using the visions, images, and atmosphere of the poem as a point of departure. Radical Light is inspired by the poem “He Held Radical Light” by A. R. Ammons.
HE HELD RADICAL LIGHT
A. R. Ammons
He held radical light
as music in his skull: music
turned, as
over ridges immanences of evening light
rise, turned
back over the furrows of his brain
into the dark, shuddered,
shot out again
in long swaying swirls of sound:
reality had little weight in his transcendence
so he
had trouble keeping
his feet on the ground, was
terrified by that
and liked himself, and others, mostly
under roofs:
nevertheless, when the
light churned and changed
his head to music, nothing could keep him
off the mountains, his
head back, mouth working,
wrestling to say, to cut loose
from the high, unimaginable hook:
released, hidden from the stars, he ate,
burped, said he was like any one
of us: demanded he
was like any one of us.
“He Held Radical Light” reprinted from A. R. Ammons' Collected Poems, 1951-1971, with the permission of
W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. Copyright © 1972 by A. R. Ammons
Version: Orchestra Version
Year composed: 2006
Duration: 00:05:00
Ensemble type: Orchestra:Standard Orchestra
Instrumentation: