1990

There’s a certain Slant of light

Composed by Leo Smit

Tinted Mountains Song Collection

"There's a certain Slant of light" is the third song in Leo Smit's song cycle Tinted Mountains. Tinted Mountains is the fifth of Smit's six song cycles setting the poetry of Emily Dickinson. For more information about Leo Smit's Emily Dickinson song cycles, please visit the pages for The Ecstatic Pilgrimage and Leo Smit. For inquiries about Leo Smit and to obtain sheet music, please contact Nils Vigeland at nvigeland@optonline.net.

Text

There’s a certain Slant of light (poem 258)
by Emily Dickinson

There’s a certain slant of light,
On winter afternoons,
That oppresses, like the weight
Of cathedral tunes.

Heavenly hurt it gives us ;
We can find no scar,
But internal difference
Where the meanings are.

None may teach it anything,
‘T is the seal, despair, —
An imperial affliction
Sent us of the air.

When it comes, the landscape listens,
Shadows hold their breath ;
When it goes, ‘t is like the distance
On the look of death.