This page contains a list of poems that are suitable for song texts. Composers of choral music are welcome to set these texts to music. If you need to get in contact with the author, please reach out through our contact page.

Winning Texts

The following texts won our 2024 song poetry contest. Cantate Domino is running a contest in which composers can submit tunes to one of these texts, to be considered for a prize.

Marlene Brubacher: Shema Israel

שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ יְהוָה אֶחָֽד

Love with your heart—and let your heart fly boldly.
Let not the Word made flesh revert to word,
But let the fire kindle, let this passion
Stir you to heights that only Love has stirred.

Love with your mind—and let His mindset mould you.
Love with the keenness of the Christ-like brain.
Love with the willingness to ponder longer,
And with the conscious choice to learn through pain.

Love with your strength—and let this mighty spirit
March on from strength to strength as years unroll
Until we see the King in all His glory,
To love Him heart to heart and soul to soul.

Lori Hershberger: Eternity in Our Hearts

As sure as the sun stirs the sap in the tree
As sure as the tide when the moon is new
As sure as the salmon journeys to sea
So our restless hearts are yearning for you

As sure as the winter gives way to the spring
As sure as the waves crash back to the shore
As sure as the geese in autumn take wing
So our roaming hearts hunt for home once more

As sure as Orion circles the skies
As sure as the pigeon homes to its nest
So heart calls to heart, so eternity cries,
So deep calls to deep, so we long for your rest.

Richard Stoltzfoos: I Cannot Comprehend

I cannot comprehend, Jesu,
How God and man are one, yet two,
How Thou, my God, art one, yet three,
And human will both bound and free.

I cannot understand, my Lord,
How sun stood still to watch the sword,
Nor how the dial reversed its tread,
Nor whence appeared the fish and bread.

And less I fathom, Holy Seed,
How I am saved by faith with deed,
Nor how Thy death hath made me free,
Least yet this truth, Thou lovest me.

Other Texts

The following texts received an honorable mention in a song poetry contest, or are poems that have been published elsewhere by the Curator.

Christopher Good: Always for All Things

Blow, silver trumpet—lead a loud refrain
Full of the glory of your perfect day.
Let four strong winds carry your song away
Until all worlds repeat its joyous strain.
 
Throb, golden lyre, with warm and welcome ring,
Through unknown spheres ablaze with cherubim,
The ecstasy of a thrice-holy hymn
Unmatched in time and place by those who sing.
 
Sing Him to Whom your melodies belong—
Sing Him of Whom their endless echoes cry.
Pour out His praise to infinite extents
Whose smile is twice the measure of your song,
Whose song, coursing through earth to highest sky,
Ravishes tired and tuneless instruments.

Lori Hershberger: Prairie Wind

Wild and keen, wild and keen,
Wind of my prairie skies–
Call from the south the song of the plains,
Sweep where the red hawk cries;
Come from the cottonwood where coyotes roam,
Over the knoll of the prairie dogs’ home,
Sing wild the song of the wandering soul,
The song of the south wind, the song of the skies.
 
Soft and slow, soft and slow,
Wind of my prairie skies–
Mourn through tallgrass the song of the plains,
Croon where the wheat field sighs;
Come over the river and gently weep,
Over the dawn where the buffalo sleep,
Sing soft the tune of the homing soul,
The song of the south wind, the song of the skies.

Lori Hershberger: Song of the Sparrows

(or Canticum Passerum)
(For all who have lost their homes because of war)
 
Long through the bitter valley of Baca
On storm-weary wings we have fled from wars
Behind us the guns, before us the night
In strange lands, and under stranger stars.
How long must we flee the fire and fighting,
And wander this valley, how long, how long?
Keeper of Sparrows, this is our sorrow
This is our sorrow, this is our song:
 
Lead us home; oh, lead us home
To you, through shades of fast-falling night!
Weave us a nest of goodness and love,
Where we may dwell in your homing light.
Beati qui habitant in domo tua, Domine
 
Even the sparrow will find a home,
Even the swallow will find a nest,
In You we will find our dwelling place,
Beneath your altar, there we will rest.
Beati qui habitant in domo tua, Domine
 
Lead us home; oh, lead us home
To you, through shades of fast-falling night!
Weave us a nest of goodness and love,
Where we may dwell in your homing light
Beati qui habitant in domo tua, Domine
 
*Blessed are they that dwell in thy house, O Lord

William Hoover: So Many Songs

So many songs are left to sing,
And how quickly sets the sun!
And as sure as night shades everything
It will set before we’re done.
 
So many songs are left to sing,
And the moon so high and bright!
And as sure as winter turns to spring
We will sing the livelong night.
 
So many songs are left to sing,
And the ember’s glow is dull;
And as sure as bees contain a sting
We will never sing them all.

Julia D. Martin: When Noble Hopes

When noble hopes, long-tended
Wilt, withered in the sun,
And purposes, suspended
Fall, fruitless one by one;
Then faith, with nurtured patience,
Not dying in the dearth,
With fondness for the Gardener,
Keeps cultivating earth.
 
When anxious wind might batter
These seedlings, straight and small;
And fearsome clouds could scatter
My hopes, why plant at all?
Firm faith, in prayerful patience,
Not wavering in the breeze,
With reverence for the Gardener,
Plants still, but on her knees.
 
Great Gardener, all your reasons
And purposes will thrive,
Though dirt is cursed, though seasons
Are dry, though winds contrive.
Your providence continues.
Let hope outlive despair.
Perpetual is Your purpose;
Perennial is Your care.

Marilyn F. Martin: All Things Are Ours

One God, by whom all things are made,
And we for Him,
One Christ, by whom all things consist—
We live by Him.
Because He reconciles all things
in earth to Him,
All things are ours, for we are Christ’s
and Christ is God’s.
 
His fulness fills the smallest place;
We are with Him.
Becoming flesh, He glorified
Our dust for Him.
The splendor, love, and strength of God
Are ours in Him.
All things are ours, for we are Christ’s,
And Christ is God’s.

Richard Stoltzfoos: On the Spirit

A great abyss of wailing waste,
Of silent nothing – not a sign
Of movement or of moment more,
But one horizon-hovering line,
The lively Spirit, breath, and wind,
The same all three, and all divine.
 
A swift word glows, and sows the waste
With particles of gathering light
Which separate and group, and breathes
Along earth’s aged satellite.
Below these far, below the birds,
Breath enters dust, and dust gains sight.
 
Ye winds which blow where’er ye list,
Ye four winds, come upon these bones,
These dead and dry, and give them flesh.
We hear of mercy in Your groans,
We sense a Presence in this tomb,
For we have souls another owns.
 
Fragrant beams of radiant moon
Light Joseph’s dreams; there seems a one,
A wiser spirit, clothed in white:
‘The hurt you fled has been undone,
Your time in Egypt has elapsed,
Return to Israel with your son.’
 
A group of vessels, vats of oil,
Ripple with lordly breath untamed,
A wind that whistles in the pines
Which lights in fire the lamps new-named;
Each surface shimmers with bold flame,
And bears a fragrance unashamed.