Description

This is the wind is a work in three movements, which may also be performed as individual works:

1 Shamal
2 Chaff
3 Palmyra

The work takes its title from the first line of James Fenton’s poem ‘Wind’ (first published in 1983): ‘This is the wind, the wind in a field of corn.’ The poem is haunted by ‘stories of fire and sword’ in which ‘Land was lost, languages rose and divided.’ The final lines offer a note of bitter consolation: ‘And somewhere they will sing: “Like chaff we were borne in the wind.” This is the wind in a field of corn.’