From Do Not Rise (2018)
I salt, II crisis, III bright one
mezzo-soprano and piano
6' 

---

I've always loved Beth Bachmann's poetry not only for how she carefully selects verbal timbre, but because she viscerally and fearlessly articulates base yet honest human emotions. While her work is often dark, light's power is not absent. The poems I set are derived from her 2015 book Do Not Rise, which deals with the psychology of war from a soldier’s perspective. The poems push, “...against grammar and logic and into phenomena.” As Elizabeth Willis, another great contemporary poet, puts it. 

​Performances:
-Kristen DiNinno and Lydia Qiu, McIntosh Theater, Ann Arbor, Michigan, December 16th, 2018.