Choose Something Like A Star - Randall Thompson video free download

A collection of amazing photos from Hubble. I thought it was a perfect companion to this deeply moving setting of a Robert Frost poem. I always come back to this piece when I need a little perspective. Performed by the New York Choral Society with the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Richard Auldon Clark, from the album "The Testament Of Freedom/Frostiana" on Koch International. *I DO NOT OWN THESE PHOTOGRAPHS*

CHOOSE SOMETHING LIKE A STAR

by Robert Frost

O Star (the fairest one in sight),

We grant your loftiness the right

To some obscurity of cloud-

It will not do to say of night,

Since dark is what brings out your light.

Some mystery becomes the proud.

But to be wholly taciturn

In your reserve is not allowed.

Say something to us we can learn

By heart and when alone repeat.

Say something! And it says 'I burn.'

But say with what degree of heat.

Talk Fahrenheit, talk Centigrade.

Use language we can comprehend.

Tell us what elements you blend.

It gives us strangely little aid,

But does tell something in the end.

And steadfast as Keats' Eremite,

Not even stooping from its sphere,

It asks a little of us here.

It asks of us a certain height,

So when at times the mob is swayed

To carry praise or blame too far,

We may choose something like a star

To stay our minds on and be staid.