Jungyoon Wie
Composer & Pianist & Educator
My Own Muse, I
Instrumentation | SSA virtual choir, a cappella
Year | 2020
Duration | 3' 40"
Premiere | co-commissioned by the Gabriela Lena Frank
Academy of Music and Wildflower Composers
Text | Carlina Duan
MY OWN MUSE, I
after Frida Kahlo
after Molly Raynor
catch my comb through greasy lines
of black. I’m a good thread. courage.
a tall note pulled I grew up here.
through my mother’s throat,
rehearsing an anthem of a country later,
she no longer belongs to. I
belong to nobody but
the dirt which sprouts
full heads of lettuce the dirt
which tells me I’m tough
enough: fingernails full
with scraps of earth, I
hang low I flit or dance.
my own
muse, I skate
flutter
a kite full of
tasseled hems over
a Midwestern
lake I come from
a geography
of blue pieces,
courage. look at me.
I grew up here. flossing
my teeth then
later, revealing my
stems, my pistils, velvet
underbelly, my petals,
pungent with
spring, & sucking in the light.