Incorruptible
Josquin Desprez, Motets
 
The bitterness of life is not revealed
as these motets unfold. The music turns
its gaze to what is incorruptible
 
as all that lives on Earth rots and decays.
Clouds on the face of the noon day, we move
up from the muck to Heaven in the end.
 
“Out of the depths I called to Thee” – the De
profundis, cry of anguish – thus remains
serene and poised, though heavy in the bass:
 
perhaps the only torment art could sanction
in the motet as Luther went to school.
And tenor, bass, and treble weave a spell
 
to fix our eyes on Heaven. This is done
in Latin, though Johannes Ockeghem
is mourned in French, that language of the court.

John Isbell

If you have any thoughts about this poem,  John Isbell would be pleased to hear them