George Crumb: Apparition - Elegiac Songs and Vocalises
Text: Walt Whitman (1819 - 1892), uit When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d

I. The night in silence under many a star 

The night, in silence, under many a star;
The ocean shore, and the husky whispering wave, whose voice I know; And the soul turning to thee, O vast and well-veil'd Death,
And the body gratefully nestling close to thee.

Vocalise 1: Summer Sounds
II. When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom’d

When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd,
I mourn'd, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring

III. Dark Mother, always gliding near, with soft feet

Dark Mother, always gliding near, with soft feet,
Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome?

Vocalise 2: Invocation

IV: Approach Strong Deliveress!

Approach, strong Deliveress!
When it is so - when thou hast taken them, I joyously sing the dead, Lost in the loving, floating ocean of thee,
Laved in the flood of thy bliss, O Death.

Vocalise 3: Death Carol (“Song of the Nightbird”)

V. Come lovely and soothing death 

Come lovely and soothing death,
Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving, In the day, in the night, to all, to each,
Sooner or later, delicate death.

VI. The night in silence under many a star

The night, in silence, under many a star;

The ocean shore, and the husky whispering wave, whose voice I know; And the soul turning to thee, O vast and well-veil'd Death,
And the body gratefully nestling close to thee.

Claude Vivier: Hymen an die Nacht
Text: Novalis-Vivier (uit Hymen an di Nacht 1799-1800)

Über der Menschen weitverbreitete Stämme herrschte vor Zeiten ein eisernes Schicksal mit stummer Gewalt.
Eine dunkle, schwere Binde lag um ihre bange Seele - Unendlich war die Erde - der Götter Aufenthalt, und ihre Heymath.

reich an Kleinodien
an Kleinodien und reich an Kleinodien herrlichen Wundern Wundern
und herrlichen Wundern
Wundern
Wundern

Ti ta ti ti ta Wundern Ti ta ti ti ta ti ta
ti ta ti ta

Seit Ewigkeiten stand ihr geheimnißvoller Bau.
Über des Morgens en Bergen, in des Meeres heiligem Schooss wohnte die Sonne, das allzündende, lebendige Licht.

Paolo Gorini: Night (e)scape 
Text: Barbara Black (2022)

I: Come to the Inside of Night

I sleepwalk in a dream mistaking lamps for stars. A voice calls to me: “Come to the inside of night.”

On the empty streets, lights, darkness in between,
I walk under the buzz of electricity.
A half-lit spider highwires through the air.
At this hour the slimmest path can take me anywhere. Wind like radio waves

from Saturn’s rings,
unheard fluttering, sphinx-moth wings.
“Come to the inside of night. See what darkness brings.” Where pavement ends, the wild begins.
I become silhouette. I become fog.
I cross the verge
to the other side.

II: Silence

Waking walking ticking talking working type-type-type telephone tapping pushing shoving clapping cowering showering shuttling tick-tack, ticka train, ticka tracka timbuctu too late too early too busy too tired too much time too little brittle broken rattling battling living leaving grieving hello goodbye hello goodbye hello goodbye—

SILENCE!
My friend, we live in chaos and confusion. The solution?
Silence:
The perfect exile.
The world suddenly alive.
The long beam of headlights on a drive through the night... Electric air after a lightning strike... A house in which all clocks have stopped...
A heron poised on a rock...
Piano without strings... A bell before it rings...

III: Dark Mirror

“Mirror of obsidian,” says an old woman in leopardine skin. “Look inside. Step within.”

In an ink-black dream, strange voices stream from my jaguar mouth. There is no world, no north, no south.
I fall into
a never-ending river, rip tides tear

my bones asunder.
A crow emerges
from a clap of thunder. And claims that
it is me.
I speak in a tongue of sticks and stones. Blood rains down to a bleeding sea. The woman carves my names on a tualang tree.
She calls me Corvus, Dream Fox, Snow-White Flower.
Actias luna, Kalliope.
“Begin again!” she shouts, and disappears.

IV: The Crystal Fox

I am crystal animal clear as your mind
I hunt for prey
in the liminal light
crystal is nothing, really; it reflects all things snow, too, is nothing the lightest hue,

a white desert where underneath lurks the prey,
its tiny heartbeat like a tiny watch
a crystal fox has prism eyes she springs into motion snow crystals fly
from her white-furred feet

when ideas are scarce, fox digs deep in a drift and waits— a fox is a question, its prey the answer.

V: Bulbophyllum nocturnum

I live alone on this far volcanic isle.
No one understands my strange perfume.
I flower in the night,
no witness to my undressing.
I die soon after
with the morning light.
Each night I wait
for a trembling breeze.
It brought me a man, who knelt before me.
I was too shy to bloom for him, I undress only in the dark. I open only once, therefore I have only one lover.
I must choose carefully who will kiss
my small, red lip.

VI: House with No Clocks—Timescape

In the House with No Clocks resides Time in its myriad states. “How can this be?” you say. Let me demonstrate.

There is no escape from time, but not all time is the same.
Look now, how Luna moth flies in, two tiny moons on her silvery wings. For a few short days she breathes, between one tick and one tock,
a Li Po life of brevity. To us a blur, a lifetime to her.
The moth is a traveller in her own silken time,
marked by scent-laden air and the cycling moons.
You fly, too, through timescapes, thinking you are winged.
You are like the moth: a brief fleck of dust seeking luminosity.

VII: Indigo Hour

The stars grow dim, one by one.
Sirius, Canopus, Acrux, Hadar.
Light blooms now in the indigo hour.
Moon fades like the face of a snow-white flower. I’m a dreamer,

I am not asleep.
Neutrinos pass through me, like small comets in the night.
I began as my own planet within,
turning in the dark
while light shone through my mother’s skin.

And I will burn
in beautiful silver dust, lips/ slicked with stars;
my nickel eyes having seen the night side of dreams.