Secular

Choral score

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Text:

I wanted so badly to be good.
I wanted everything to turn out right
in the end. I wanted to go to heaven.

Whatever I thought I should lose, 
I lost; whatever the cost,
I paid it. Nothing was too much.

I worked hard at letting go; I 
learned the art of denial. Wine 
turned into water, bread to stone.

I was the bone singing in the desert, 
the gate swinging on its hinge;
I was the bell ringing and ringing.

- Joyce Sutphen, “Empty” from Naming the Stars. Copyright © 2004 by Joyce Sutphen. Used by permission of The Permissions Company, Inc,. on behalf of Holy Cow! Press, www.holycowpress.org. All rights reserved worldwide.