Branch by Branch: Edna St. Vincent Millay and H. Leslie Adams

06/01/21 • 23 min

The protagonist in Edna St. Vincent Millay's poem looks upon a tree that has died and wonders what caused it to wither. She stands apart from the scene, awed and perplexed, but at a crucial moment enters the scene and takes a decisive action. In H. Leslie Adams's song, that action seems even more decisive—and even more brutal.
The recording of "Branch by Branch" is by Darryl Taylor and Robin Guy, and comes from a CD called Love Rejoices: Songs of H. Leslie Adams.
Branch by Branch
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Branch by branch this tree has died.
Green only is one last bough
Moving its leaves in the sun.
What evil ate its root,
What blight,
What ugly thing?
Let the mole say,
The bird sing,
Or the white worm behind the shedding bark
Tick in the dark.
You and I have only one thing to do,
Saw, saw, saw the trunk through.

Previous Episode

Welcome to Resounding Verse

Announcing a new podcast about poetry and song. Join music theorist Stephen Rodgers as he explores how composers transform words into songs. Each episode discusses one poem and one musical setting of it. The music is diverse—covering a variety of styles and time periods, and focusing on composers from underrepresented groups—and the tone is accessible and personal. If you love poetry and song, no matter your background and expertise, this show is for you. Episodes are 20-30 minutes long and air on the first of every month. The podcast launches on Tuesday, June 1, with a batch of three episodes.
The trailer features a clip from Farayi Malek's song "Phenomenal Woman" (sung by the composer) and Josephine Lang's song "Scheideblick" (performed by mezzo-soprano Milagro Vargas and pianist Susan Manoff).

Next Episode

To My Little Son: Julia Johnson Davis and Florence Price

In Julia Johnson Davis's poem "To My Little Son," a mother imagines what her baby boy will look like when he's twenty-one years old, and wonders whether, when he's grown up, she'll see glimmers of the boy in the man. Thinking of her own son, Florence Price turned to Davis's poem and created a song that is nuanced, affecting, and deeply personal.
The recording of “To My Little Son” is by soprano Arwen Myers and pianist Monica Ohuchi.
Learn more about Price's songs, access scores, and hear video performances of her songs by bass-baritone Justin Hopkins and pianist Jeanne-Minette Cilliers, and countertenor Darryl Taylor and pianist Deborah Hollist on Art Song Augmented, my website devoted to art songs by underrepresented composers.
To My Little Son
by Julia Johnson Davis
In your face I sometimes see
Shadowings of the man to be,
And eager, dream of what my son
Shall be in twenty years and one.

But when you are to manhood grown,
And all your manhood ways are known,
Then shall I, wistful, try to trace
The child you once were in your face.