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Songbird

from Horsetamer by Julia Ecklar

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about

When I was 14, I read the beautiful short story, “Mikal’s Songbird,” in Analog magazine. As a lover of both science fiction and music, I felt that I had found the perfect blend of the two. The story of a talented but damaged boy, and his torturous journey toward salvation, stayed with me long after my mother threw out the original magazine. I couldn’t have told you the author’s name, but I remembered everything about the Songhouse.

I glimpsed a book cover in the store three years later, and knew immediately that it was the same story. That copy of Songmaster would be my official introduction to Orson Scott Card as a novelist, and would lead me to all his other wonderful fiction. With this as my background, you would think I would have written this song. Instead, another songwriter beat me to it, creating something so beautiful and perfect that it left me nothing else I could add. Except, of course, to sing it here.

lyrics

I was bought in the market for silver and song,
And I grew in the Songhouse to be noble and strong.
And my songs grew within me, and my voice soon took wing,
And the love cradled ‘round me with each note I’d sing.

I dwell in the Songhouse,
And song is my breath.
I’ll sing my life long, then in shrouds made of song,
I will sleep at my death.
I was born to be Songbird,
And the song shall be love.
And the music shall rise from the depths of the skies
To the planets above.

As the Emperor’s Songbird I was trained from the start.
From the very first teacher who opened my heart
To the people who heard me in the Palace each day,
I have given my music and my spirit away.

I am old now and silent, and my songs are all sung,
And the words of my life now may not pass my tongue.
But the glory still haunts me, and the lessons survive,
And the work of the Songbirds must continue to thrive.

credits

from Horsetamer, released April 6, 2013
Soprano Soloist: Katy Shackleton Williams
Flute & Piccolo: Barbara O’Brien
Violin & Viola Solos: Warren Davidson
Cello: David Premo
Additional Strings: Irene Cheng & Jennifer Gerhard
Sampled Harp: Michael Moricz

Song © 1982 Kathy Mar

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Julia Ecklar Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

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