Many years ago I found a remarkable poem and set the first verse to music, as a kind of anthem or chorale. Or maybe that first verse was all there was, I don't remember. Here it is:
When I a ship see on the seas
Cuft with those wa'try savages,
And therewithal behold it hath
In all that way no beaten path,
Then with a wonder I confesse
Thou art our way in the wilderness.
I found this text very powerful and moving and was also very taken, though also a bit dissatisfied, with the setting I'd created for it. But for some reason this "anthem" never got completed. Over the years I kept coming back to this work, but was never able to make much progress because I needed more words and couldn't locate the original poem. I have no recollection of who wrote it or even whether it's complete as is or just a fragment. Judging from the language and the spelling, it dates from 16th or 17th Century Britain, I guess. But no amount of research on the Internet or via my local library reference desk has yielded any clue as to who the author might be or where I might go to find the complete poem.
Recently I decided that if I really wanted to make something out of this piece I'd need to add verses of my own. But when I tried to do this a very strange thing happened. The verses I added were very different in spirit from the original. They came out sounding like something Brecht would write! So I decided to make this anthem a part of my Brecht project and will probably find a way to include it in one of the scenes of my "musical." Here is the text as it exists so far. Click on the title to hear the musical setting (which I finally managed to get "just right"):
by Anonymous and Victor Grauer
copyright 2000, by Victor A. Grauer
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When I a ship see on the seas
Cuft with those wa'try savages,
And therewithal behold it hath
In all that way no beaten path,
Then with a wonder I confesse
Thou art our way in the wilderness.
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When I a child see in the streets
Cuffed by the authority of the police,
And therewithal behold he had
In custody been beaten bad,
Is it no wonder he'll confesse?
That is the way of the wildernesse.
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I see the mayor of our town
Always a player when the deals go down,
And therewithal behold his pack
In ev'ry vote get beaten back.
Is it no wonder, nevertheless,
They'll get their way in this wildernesse.