Music

by Anne Porter

When I was a child
I once sat sobbing on the floor
Beside my mother’s piano
As she played and sang
For there was in her singing
A shy yet solemn glory
My smallness could not hold

And when I was asked
Why I was crying
I had no words for it
I only shook my head
And went on crying

Why is it that music
At its most beautiful
Opens a wound in us
An ache a desolation
Deep as a homesickness
For some far-off
And half-forgotten country

I’ve never understood
Why this is so

But there’s an ancient legend
From the other side of the world
That gives away the secret
Of this mysterious sorrow

For centuries on centuries
We have been wandering
But we were made for Paradise
As deer for the forest

And when music comes to us
With its heavenly beauty
It brings us desolation
For when we hear it

We half remember
That lost native country
We dimly remember the fields
Their fragrant windswept clover
The birdsongs in the orchards
The wild white violets in the moss
By the transparent streams

And shining at the heart of it
Is the longed-for beauty
Of the One who waits for us
Who will always wait for us
In those radiant meadows

Yet also came to live with us
And wanders where we wander.

"Music" by Anne Porter from Living Things: Collected Poems.
© Steerforth Press, 2006.  Click link to buy now.

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In a guest appearance on a 2002 DVD released by 1 Giant Leap, Kurt Vonnegut says, "Music is, to me, proof of the existence of God. It is so extraordinarily full of magic, and in tough times of my life I can listen to music and it makes such a difference".  In his last published book before his death (“Man Without a Country”), Vonnegut said much the same thing:  "If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph: The only proof he needed for the existence of God was music."

Anne Porter’s poem “Music” reminded me of what Vonnegut had said and also reminded me of the importance of music in my own life.  One example will hopefully suffice to illustrate this.  I think it is safe to say that it was the singing of one hymn in one worship service that led me to attend the Theological School at Drew for my M.Div.  You see, I was at a Convocation on Ministry at Drew in March 1985, and at the end of the worship service we stood and sang a hymn I was unfamiliar with at the time.  Having grown up in the Church of God, I knew songs like “Amazing Grace,” “I’ll Fly Away,” and “I Saw the Light.”  I had never heard the hymn “This Is My Song,” though I had played the tune “Finlandia” in band in High School.  From the first note played on the organ to the concluding word of the hymn, I was entranced by the beauty of both the voices and the lyrics.  I knew right then and there that I would attend Drew, and sure enough, I eventually did in the fall of 1986.

I am sure that many of you know the words of this beautiful hymn, and maybe you have sung it so many times that its meaning has become obscured.  Just in case this might be so, the words are printed below.  They truly remind me “of the One who waits for us, who will always wait for us in those radiant meadows, yet also came to live with us and wanders where we wander.”

Tune: FINLANDIA, Jean Sibelius
Vv. 1-2: Lloyd Stone
Vv. 3-5: George Harkness

This is my song, O God of all the nations,
a song of peace for lands afar and mine;
this is my home, the country where my heart is;
here are my hopes, my dreams, my holy shrine:
but other hearts in other lands are beating
with hopes and dreams as true and high as mine.

My country’s skies are bluer than the ocean,
and sunlight beams on cloverleaf and pine;
but other lands have sunlight too, and clover,
and skies are everywhere as blue as mine:
O hear my song, thou God of all the nations,
a song of peace for their land and for mine.

This is my song, O God of all the nations,
a prayer that peace transcends in every place;
and yet I pray for my beloved country —
the reassurance of continued grace:
Lord, help us find our oneness in the Savior,
in spite of differences of age and race.

May truth and freedom come to every nation;
may peace abound where strife has raged so long;
that each may seek to love and build together,
a world united, righting every wrong;
a world united in its love for freedom,
proclaiming peace together in one song.

This is my prayer, O Lord of all earth’s kingdoms,
thy kingdom come, on earth, thy will be done;
let Christ be lifted up ’til all shall serve him,
and hearts united, learn to live as one:
O hear my prayer, thou God of all the nations,
myself I give thee — let thy will be done.