A poem that inspired many songs

Tonight I was going through one of my notebooks. In college, I had a professor who always told us to write everything down, even if it might seem silly, just to get it out. Years later, I actually started doing this. I always used to hate writing things down. And if I did write things down, I would never go back and read them. But when I moved to New York, it was like I had no choice. This city pulls things out of you. This was a poem I fell in love with and wrote in my first "New York" notebook. Looking back at it now, I realize it has inspired many songs.

When I woke up I was in a forest.
The dark seemed natural, the sky through the pine trees thick with many lights.
I knew nothing; I could do nothing but see.
And as I watched, all the lights of heaven faded to make a single thing, a fire burning through the cold firs.
Then it wasn't possible any longer to stare at heaven and not be destroyed.
Are there souls that need death's presence, as I require protection?
I think if I speak long enough I will answer that question.
I will see whatever they see, a ladder reaching through the firs, whatever calls them to exchange their lives -- think what I understand already.
I woke up ignorant in a forest; only a moment ago, I didn't know my voice if one were given me would be so full of grief, my sentences like cries strung together.
I didn't even know I felt grief until that word came, until I felt rain streaming from me.

- Louise Gluck

Beautiful photo by Matt Callow