Little Talk
Spiders
Snail’s Pace
Butterfly Wings

Since my first introduction to the prize-winning poetry of Aileen Fisher as a young mother, I have been a very vocal fan of her whimsical word crafting for children. While searching for fresh material to provide winsome lyrics for the younger kids of Seattle Children’s Chorus, I stumbled upon these four poems in “Always Wondering,” a collection of “Some Favorite Poems.” I quickly and joyfully got to work creating A Small Suite. Kris Mason, Artistic Director, conducted the premiere, and soon after, Alliance Music Publications, Inc. became its publisher, bringing the music and the poetry that I loved into many lives. Each piece stands alone, but they are designed as an integral seamless whole, musically and thematically.

“Little Talk”
Don’t you think it’s probable
that beetles, bugs, and bees
talk about a lot of things–
you know, such [things] as these:

The kind of weather where they live
in jungles tall with grass,
and earthquakes in their villages
whenever people pass.

Of course, we’ll never know if bugs
talk very much at all–
because our ears are far too big
for talk that is so small.
———-
“Spiders”
Spiders are so sort-of-thin,
whatever do they keep it in–
the yards of thread they need to spin?
———-
“Snail’s Pace”
Maybe it’s so
that snails are slow:
they trudge along and tarry.

But isn’t it true
you’d slow up, too,
if you had a house to carry?
———-
“Butterfly Wings”
How would it be
on a day in June
to open your eyes
in a dark cocoon,

And soften one end
and crawl outside,
and find you had wings
to open wide,

And find you could fly
to a bush or tree
or float on the air
like a boat at sea…

How would it BE?

by Aileen Fisher

Originally I arranged this stirring Celtic hymn for two flutes (Along with My Love I’ll Go), and interwove the original hymn tune with a novel counter theme. The SSA version echoes that original arrangement with the addition of a flute. When writing the version for Bel Canto, the SSA youth choir of Bellevue Presbyterian, I was asked to create an optional Baritone part for the young male voices. Also, I’ve added an extended piano introduction, and have written words for the counter theme that precedes the traditional hymn:

I do not know the way to go,
the steps that I should take
to walk in paths of righteousness
for Thy name’s sake.
—————————————————
And the prayer, poetically expressed by a long-forgotten Celt, provides powerful inspiration for all followers of Jesus Christ across time and space:

Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me save that thou art.
Thou my best thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, thy presence my light.

Be thou my wisdom, be thou my true word;
I ever with thee, and thou with me, Lord.
Thou my great Father, thy child I will be,
Thou in me dwelling, and I one with thee.

Riches I heed not, nor vain empty praise;
Thou mine inheritance, now and always.
Thou and thou only first in my heart,
High King of heaven, my treasure thou art.

High King of heaven, when vict’ry is won,
May I reach heaven’s joys, O bright heav’n’s Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my vision, O Ruler of all.