For what are we thankful for?  For all:
     The sunlight -- the shadow -- the song;
The blossoms may wither and fall,
     But the world moves in music along!
          For simple, sweet living,
               ('Tis love that doth teach it)
          A heaven forgiving
               And faith that can reach it!

-- Frank L. Stanton

Read from some humbler poet,
     Whose songs gushed from his heart,
As showers from the clouds of summer,
     Or tears from the eyelids start;

Who, through long days of labor,
     And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
     Of wonderful melodies.

Such songs have power to quiet
     The restless pulse of care,
And come like the benediction
     That follows after prayer.

-- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Say not, I live!"
     Unless the morning's trumpet brings
A shock of glory to your soul,
     Unless the ecstasy that sings
Through rushing worlds and insects' wings,
     Sends you upspringing to your goal,
Glad of the need for toil and strife,
     Eager to grapple hands with Life --
Say not, "I live!"

-- Angela Morgan

Thank Thee that I can hear,
Finely and keenly with the inner ear,
Below the rush and clamor of a throng
The mighty music of the under-song.
And when the day has journeyed to its rest,
Lo, as I listen, from the amber west,
Where the great organ lifts its glowing spires,
There sounds the chanting of the unseen choirs.

-- Angela Morgan

When composers begin the act of composition, they wish to reach out to something greater than they are -- to embody a feeling in a new and unique way. . . . . In the act of composition, something touches the spirit side of the composer, employing that ability to reach out beyond him or herself to something greater.

-- Weston Noble