Jerusalem (from Longing for Home) – Carol Barnett

Composer: Carol Barnett

Text by: Robert Mezey (b. 1935)

Instrumentation baritone, piano

Duration: approx.  2'45"

Date Written:  2018

Composer’s note: Longing for Home is a song cycle written to celebrate Source Song Festival’s fifth season. The texts all reference homecoming in various ways – the enduring wish to return to a place remembered with love and longing, as well as the uncertainty, the impossibility of doing so.

“Jerusalem” – a cry of anguish echoes from the 11th century for a once-magnificent city, now in ruins, reduced to rubble. The musical influences of Jerusalem include Jewish liturgical cantillation, middle-eastern scales with their frequent augmented seconds, and word-painting – the soaring of an eagle, the excruciating sting of a scorpion. Physician, poet and philosopher Judah Halevi was born in 11th-century Spain, and died in 1141 shortly after arriving in the Holy Land. He is considered one of the greatest Hebrew poets, celebrated both for his religious and his secular works, many of which appear in present-day Jewish liturgy. Translator Robert Mezey is a contemporary American poet and academic. 

The full cycle can be found here: https://opusimprints.com/products/longing-for-home-carol-barnett

text

JERUSALEM (after Halevi)

Beautiful heights, city of a great King,
From the western coast my desire burns towards thee.
Pity and tenderness burst in me, remembering
Thy former glories, thy temple now broken stones.
I wish I could fly to thee on the wings of an eagle
And mingle my tears with thy dust.
I have sought thee, love, though the King is not there
And instead of Gilead’s balm, snakes and scorpions.
Let me fall on thy broken stones and tenderly kiss them—
The taste of thy dust will be sweeter than honey to me.

Robert Mezey (b. 1935)