Mariposa (2017)

a four-part male choir

Duration

about 4 minutes and 30 seconds

Voicing

Countertenor, Tenor, Baritone, and Bass

Reading

Performers: New York Polyphony

Program Notes

Inspired by Edna St. Vincent Millay’s poem, Mariposa explores the fleeting duality of light and dark. Walking through an ethereal landscape, innocence approaches the gravity of mortality.

Poem

Mariposa
By Edna St. Vincent Millay

Butterflies are white and blue
In this field we wander through.
Suffer me to take your hand.
Death comes in a day or two.

All the things we ever knew
Will be ashes in that hour,
Mark the transient butterfly,
How he hangs upon the flower.

Suffer me to take your hand.
Suffer me to cherish you
Till the dawn is in the sky.
Whether I be false or true,
Death comes in a day or two.