Please join Synkroniciti in welcoming back poet and writer Stacie Eirich, now based in the Houston, Texas area, with “This is What Makes Us,” a tribute to Karl Jenkins and his work One World, performed at the 2023 Unesco Concert for Peace by a stage group in Linz, Austria and singers from forty-seven countries around the globe forming the Stay at Home Choir. This poem opens the “Identity” issue in an atmosphere of communion and listening. Stacie compares the myriad forces coming together to natural phenomena–from waters making a river to the leaves and branches of trees. “Breaking/ Opening—/ Releasing// these are our souls/ playing together/ swelling of strings// Ripples of many languages/ many voices/ intertwining.” We don’t always hear nature, but nature is life, and so is the song of hope implanted in hearts across the world, even, perhaps especially, when things feel hostile and dangerous. This is a big-hearted poem beginning in ripples that become waves. Choral music is one of the most powerful arts for building community, as it requires communal commitment, understanding and focus. What we do, we do together, and Stacie gives us a glimpse of the wonder of performing and being swept up in the work. Can we harness this sort of energy to rebuild and recover our world?
Read “This is What Makes us” in Synkroniciti’s “Identity” issue, available for purchase here: https://synkroniciti.com/the-magazine/purchase-individual-issues/.
Stacie Eirich is a mother of two, writer and singer near Houston, Texas. She has written poetry, short fiction and nonfiction published in literary journals, magazines and anthologies. Her latest book, Hope Like Sunlight, published in December 2024, is an illustrated memoir of her family’s journey to a cure for their child from pediatric brain cancer. All proceeds from the book go to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital & Ronald McDonald House; find it on Amazon.