Wild flower was commissioned by a Song Company subscriber as a gift for his seriously ill partner on a text he selected for performance by The Song Company. The work was composed in September 2006 and draws its text from the Old Testament prophet, Ezekiel.

At birth, the very day you were born,

There was no one to cut your cord,

Or wash you in clean water,

Or rub you with salt,

Or wrap you in cloth.

No one leaned kindly over you to do anything like that for you.

You were left in the open fields;

You were as unloved as that on the day you were born.

I saw you struggling in your blood as I was passing,

And I said to you as you lay in your blood:

Live,

Live in your blood,

And grow like a wild flower,

Grow like the grass of the fields.

Adapted from Ezekiel 16: 4-7, The Jerusalem Bible by the composer.

© Andrew Schultz, 2006.