Melissa Dunphy

Commissioned by the 2025 Soprano-Alto Advanced Choirs Commission Consortium of the American Choral Directors Association.

Score will be made available in June 2026 following the consortium choirs' premieres.

Finding relief from oppressive forces in dance-like musings on the tiniest of new lives, exploring themes of hope and resilience. Text by H. Hart.

Text

Nymphs
By H. Hart

This grotesque,
this comic noir,
this black mass of
soul-crushing powers,
obliterated for a spring hour
by a mantis nymph, poised on a flower.
I am mad with miracles and overwrought with cares.
The human world crumbles, but this is something rare:
an egg case has broken, all the mantids born,
tiny nymphs set upon leaf and stem.
I am awash in heaven,
the graceful tidings
of a hundred alien faces
come to fairy the trees,
and the peace of these small lives,
felt most keenly on a little patch of home
under a sovereign blue sky.
For one spring hour,
my precious girl and I
are a respite of eyes,
glittering curiosity
at this skittering ballet
of mantid babes.
May they grow to box
all enemies,
to fight, to pray,
and never be a feast
for birds,
reptiles,
or lesser beasts,
but deftly skirt away,
to live,
to pray
another day.

Artwork by H. Hart.