Noah’s Children
The melody and rhyme structure for “Noah’s Children” had existed in my mind for years before I wrote the song in its finished form. For almost a decade, I knew that the subject matter was violent, and that it occurred at Easter. The only lyric I had was:
Easter time and the world is new
Lillies of the valley and the daffodils bloom…
The song wasn’t about Easter, though. I knew that much, but I knew no more. So, the fragment took up a room in the back of my mind. There was a straight-backed wooden chair in the room, and it sat there, humming in darkness until one day I realized that I had a story about human justice for an unspeakable crime. The juxtaposition of human spirits struggling to make do and survive between light and dark, the Earthly and the Divine, suddenly fell into the rhythm of the fragment. The fragment jumped up out of its chair and scribbled down the lyrics on the wall of its lonely cell, and that’s the song you’re hearing now.
The themes of this song are dark, yes, but I believe that they are incredibly important during this era in America. The people today who are making policy and bending ethics to their own morality see no implicit problem with the unasked-for motherhood of Mary, the young girl who was “overshadowed” by the spirit of the Lord. The comfort with which they make laws to restrict the freedoms of women has everything to do with this unspoken complicity in the continued “overshadowing” of women and girls by their vision of God.
My friends, I do not consider myself a Christian, but I have been raised with those teachings, and the stories are in my bones. I don’t seek to tear anyone down or strike some blow against church. But I’ve noticed how rarely it is remarked upon how terrified Mary must have been. How thoroughly her world must have been turned upside down. How lonely she must have been in her hopes and fears.
I urge you to think about this. If you’re someone who believes that the dismantling of women’s healthcare in America is positive movement toward a more righteous and godly country, I would like you to take a moment, for me, to wonder less about what Jesus would do, and more about the help and community and understanding that Mary would need.
And that’s all I have to say. I love you guys. Thanks for listening and reading. In fact, thanks for everything.
In my undergrad English Lit program I took a class called "Visions and Revisions" with an incredible professor. We read source material and then creative re-visionings of them--eg Beowulf and then Grendel. One group of writings was Apocrypha, which were specifically about the Spirit visiting Mary. In those writings she was very afraid, uncertain, and not at all jazzed to be some kind of deity mule. We then read The Handmaid's Tale. As you can see, I've never, EVER forgotten that material. I think about it now more than ever. I'm a "saw you at a free concert in Copley Square, Boston" years old fan. Grateful for your art and humanity-always.
Beekeepers and botanists like to plant contrasting colors of wildflowers together (violet and pale yellow, deep pink and white) because bees are more attracted to flowers that stand out from one another. The deeper the contrast, the happier the bee, the sweeter the honey.
That's how I feel listening to your work. You've got bitter notes in your happiest songs and great warmth in your saddest (the last verse of Another New World always makes me cry). Nobody writes the coexistence of the sacred and the profane the way you do.