Description
Jocelyn Hagen’s “Give Joan A Sword” pairs choir, cello, piano, chimes, and handbells with powerful text by Sister M. Thérèse. The poet’s brother was killed in the fall of Bataan and Corregidor during the Second World War, and Hagen’s intense music brings to life Sister M. Thérèse’s anguished, but also deeply devotional, language. Give Joan A Sword invokes the spiritual energy of one of history’s most powerful women. Exalted as she is, Joan of Arc also becomes Sister M. Thérèse’s poetic avatar, an outlet for the writer’s feelings of powerlessness and frustration in the face of war: “How can she keep her soul in calm,” she asks of Joan/herself, “when towers of Rheims and Notre Dame send up their cry of muted bells that tear her heart with moans and knells?” More personally, “How must her hands have ached to hold her shining sword when pain patrolled the glory-riddled crimson shore of Bataan, and Corregidor.” In the end, however, it is clear that Sister M. Thérèse does not yearn for the power to join the violence, but rather to end it: “O God of peace, give Joan a sword! And in this moment send her down to Domrémy, to every town!
~ Dr. Leah Weinberg
performed by Kantorei, conducted by Joel Rinsema
Text
The night down on Domrémy,
Dark wings have circled every tree,
Shut out the stars and steeped the sky
In anguish lifted like a cry.
Shaking the young stars from her gown,
Pushing the moon back, Joan peers down
On lands by terror twisted bare
That shake with battle everywhere.
A blight is on the world again;
A blight is in the souls of men;
And dark is death and dark is birth
As sorry runs along the earth.
How can she keep her soul in calm
When towers of Rheims and Notre Dame
Send up their cry of muted bells
That tear her heart with moans and knells?
How must her hands have ached to hold
Her shining sword when pain patrolled
The glory-riddled crimson shore
Of Bataan, and Corregidor.
How must her lips have burned to cry
A challenge to the southern sky
For heroes who would never see
The sunset stain the Coral Sea.
Young Joan is restless in the sky;
Young Joan is burning to defy
The sign that sickens men with pride;
Back to the wars young Joan would ride!
To rout this bitter pagan horde,
O God of peace, give Joan a sword!
And in this moment send her down
To Domrémy, to every town!
~ Sister M. Thérèse