Sleep and Unremembrance

Written in 2015, Sleep & Unremembrance for orchestra is a reflection on the poem While Sleeping by Polish poet Wis?awa Szymborska. This particular poem, which was one of the last written before her death in 2012, grapples with the idea that memories often change so dramatically that they simply end up disappearing. What remains is a frantic quest to remember all of the things that mark our lives as special until we come to terms with the fact that forgetting is part of the cycle of life. Unique to Szymborska is her ability to find beauty and spontaneity in the simplest and most mundane objects and everyday activities. In this poem for example, dreams become a metaphor for time; sleep, a metaphor for death; drawers, a metaphor for secrets; snow, a metaphor for frailty. To me, this lends Szymborskas poetry a profound sense of humanity. The music that I have written attempts to capture the spirit and energy of this poem. Simple musical ideas such as a four-note ascending, scalar figure (heard at the opening of the piece) and sequences of parallel sixths are molded into highly recognizable gestures that reach far beyond their ordinary structural characteristics. As the piece develops, these kinds of ideas recede into the background as if they have changed or cannot be remembered anymore. Though this is only an excerpt of the piece, what will ultimately set the completed version of the work apart from the poem is perspective. Szymborska undoubtedly knew that she was near to her death when she wrote the poem, making the text a powerful opportunity to look back on life past. I, however, see it as a reminder that behind every corner lurks mystery, surprise and change. Thus, the music twists and turns in search of its own memories and its true identity. WHILE SLEEPING I dreamed I was looking for something, maybe hidden somewhere or lost under the bed, under the stairs, under an old address. I dug through wardrobes, boxes and drawers pointlessly packed with stuff and nonsense. I pulled from my suitcases the years and journeys Id picked up. I shook from my pockets withered letters, litter, leaves not addressed to me. I ran panting through comforting, discomfiting displaces, places. I floundered through tunnels of snow and unremembrance. I got stuck in thorny thickets and conjectures. I swam through air and the grass of childhood. I hustled to finish up before the outdated dusk fell, the curtain, silence. In the end I stopped knowing what Id been looking for so long. I woke up. Looked at my watch. The dream took not quite two and a half minutes. Such are the tricks to which time resorts ever since is started stumbling on sleeping heads. WIS?AWA SZYMBORSKA | TRANLSATION: CLARE CAVANAGH