2003
Sunflower
Composed by 
Paul Salerni
Paul Salerni Text by 
John Updike
John Updike Flora Song Collection
"Sunflower" is the fifth and final song of Paul Salerni's Flora, which sets five poems of John Updike.
Text
Sunflower
by John Updike
Sunflower, of flowers
the most lonely,
yardstick of hours,
long-term stander
in empty spaces,
shunner of bowers,
indolent bender
seldom, in only
the sharpest of showers:
tell us, why
is it your face is
a snarl of jet swirls
and gold arrows, a burning
old lion face high
in a cornflower sky,
yet by turning
your head we find
you wear a girl’s
bonnet behind?
–John Updike: Collected Poems 1953-1993, pp. 6-7
Audio
“Sunflower” (from “Flora”)
Debra Field (soprano)1:58