So, I spent my evenings in South Africa, really writing about a Russian composer brought back to life. I would sit in a sports bar, drinking beer and eating burgers. Below are the lyrics that I have written and sent to Lewis Murphy the composer. He is composer in residence at Glyndbourne, and I feel privileged to work with him. We saw eye to eye immediately, and he is Scottish, down to earth and someone who I would gladly collaborative with again if given the chance.
I used to write a lot of poetry, I stopped. I don't know why. I think the world changed. It seems like the world isn't interested in poetry anymore. I think poetry is really the language of our dreams and if we don't write poems, experience them, then how can we bring our dreams to life?
The lyrics I wrote are about sudden death, and sudden being brought back to life. They are about Musorgsky, alive again realising that he has been brought back to life for a purpose, to be asked about Russia by the living. He answers them, and dies suddenly.
MUSORGSKY
We all die in flight,
Flap-fall silent as bats,
Slap into the great swelling hill,
Of moonlit sea.
Called back to the great,
Not to be.
Deep Time passed.
MUSS-org-ski.
I heard the name,
A woman was calling
And like a bullet leaving a brain,
sucked back into the barrel of a gun,
Into a game of roulette not yet begun,
I came back to life
I remembered it was my name
MUSS-org-ski.
I sat up in fury,
MUSS-org-ski.
Back again amongst the lumpen multitude
MUSORGSKI!
A black haired woman, held out a hot cup of coffee
As if death were a hangover
From which you sober up
Life is the hangover,
But I gladly took the cup
Like all dead,
I would have licked the sacrifice from the floor
For a minute more
Of human life.
You honoured me with the cup.
MUS-org-Ski at your service.
I will now go ahead
I already know my task
Why the living call the dead.
It is to ask the questions
About how man should live
I see Russia is the question
This answer I can give.
The world is but a bed in space
On which the nations sleep
At night we fight for the blanket
None has the right to keep
If Russia vast and measureless
Pulls the covers to her head
Her fate is always certain,
Her feet will freeze instead.
Listen to MUSS-org-ski.
My pulse has long-time gone
The ladies loved MUSS-org-ski.
They listened to his song
Love Russia just a little
See what you might get,
Her woman will dance you a ballet
Her men will walk into lead,
So kiss each toe gently
And sew each tear with thread
There is no need of a celestial blanket
We we have each other instead.
All of us die flying,
fall silent into the sea.
So, now is time to leave you
Called back to the great,
Not to be.