by Walt Whitman (1819 - 1892)
The voice of the rain
Language: English
And who art thou? said I to the soft-falling shower, Which, strange to tell, gave me an answer, as here translated: I am the Poem of Earth, said the voice of the rain, Eternal I rise impalpable out of the land and the bottomless sea, Upward to heaven, whence, vaguely form'd, altogether changed, and yet the same, I descend to lave the drouths, atomies, dust-layers of the globe, And all that in them without me were seeds only, latent, unborn; And forever, by day and night, I give back life to my own origin, and make pure and beautify it; (For song, issuing from its birth-place, after fulfilment, wandering, Reck'd or unreck'd. duly with love returns.)
Authorship:
- by Walt Whitman (1819 - 1892) [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Oliver Knussen, CBE (1952 - 2018), "The voice of the rain", op. 25 no. 4 (1991) [soprano and piano], from Whitman Settings, no. 4, confirmed with a score [ sung text checked 1 time]
Researcher for this page: Malcolm Wren [Guest Editor]
This text was added to the website: 2018-10-11
Line count: 10
Word count: 116