A cappella Publisher Desc.  "Flowers Faded and Gone was composed for the PREMIERE|Project of Choral Arts Initiative's 2022 season. The text, by child poet Hilda Conkling, depicts the wilting of a bowl of calendula flowers. There is a profound innocence and wisdom to the poem, which I used in this case to represent my experience with the loss of my grandparents, Dick Walters and Lenora Tuomi, both of whom passed in 2021. The soprano solo in this work represents an amalgam of Conkling, and myself as a child, extending love and consolation to my mother and father, each of whom had just lost their own father and mother respectively. The music moves through keys as it navigates the path between grief and acceptance, ultimately never finishing in a defined home key, as even acceptance does not mark the end of grief, just the point at which living feels possible again.