Leadership

Clair de Lune Music by Claude Debussy and Poem by Paul Verlaine

December 7, 2020  • Executive Leadership Seminars Department

download READING

Listen Here

Meditation

Clair de Lune, its title French for “moonlight” is based on the poem of the same name by Symbolist poet Paul Verlaine. In both the famed classical music piece and its lesser-known companion, we are taken through a journey to introspection – the lifetime adventure of understanding the soul in all its phases. The journey to better know ourselves, from all-victorious love to sad, beaming beauty, is a clumsy dance. We rarely feel grace in the peaks and valleys of life’s seasons – and Debussy and Verlaine knew as such. Third in a set of four movements set to a larger-than-life and somewhat inelegant dance called the Bergamask, the beauty of the melody perfectly complements the theatrical farce. Life is clumsy, and no less beautiful for it. What grace accompanies your own clumsy dance?

Brianna Curran, Washington, DC

Related
Wellsprings of Living and Leading
April 15, 2020 •