Work
The Ecstatic
for mixed-voice choir and piano
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About
Irish-born poet Cecil Day-Lewis spent most of his life in England, teaching at both Cambridge and Oxford Universities, and at his death was the poet laureate. He also wrote detective novels under a pseudonym. The poem "The Ecstatic" is a description of a skylark swooping and diving, which to the poet suggests a state of ecstasy. In the middle of the three stanzas the poet addresses the bird directly and calls it "a singing star, a note of light". At the end of the poem, the day comes to a close and the bird drops down towards the estuary and presumably a peaceful night's sleep.
Commissioned note
"The Ecstatic" was written for Choralation (Westlake Girls and Westlake Boys High Schools), and conductor Rowan Johnston
Text note
text by Cecil Day-Lewis