Students at Berklee College of Music created songs inspired by mentees’ pieces
Students at Berklee College of Music recently created songs inspired by three mentees’ pieces: “Ancestral Hunger Feeds on Hollow Memories” by Kayla Morgan, “Lost & Found” by Shamu W., and “enough” by Mahdia Tully Carr. Listen below!
All of the mentees’ pieces are featured in our 25th anniversary book, Girls Write Now On The Art Of The Craft: A Guidebook To Collaborative Storytelling (HarperOne, April 2024).
“Ancestral Hunger Feeds on Hollow Memories”
Song credits: Molly Cleary (Vocals), Leo Gao (Piano, Production), Kirill Pudavov (Saxophone), and Hayden Shea (Guitar)
“Ancestral Hunger Feeds on Hollow Memories” by Kayla Morgan
As a child, I would peel layers of putrid pomegranates
and plant their forgotten savoriness in my soul. Sentimental,
for seasons of flavored fruit my body has never eaten.
My tongue craves beloved tastes under fatherly sun,
extracted from the nostalgic palm of motherly love –
where satisfaction is more than a childbearing promise,
but a kept birthright.
My spirit envisions lineages to be conservative, classically
unending. My fingers were never fermented in normalcy,
but my body can’t help but believe in sanity, yet my throat
detests the disappointing scent of pomegranates.
Spring never once blossomed into my plate. No floral fruition
of familiarity, no blood blooming under the intimacy of spring.
I can only recall the grim of pollen, its aroma, unfair and unsettling.
When new beginnings feel like death, unsolicited blessings
like nightmares – when did pomegranates become so
rotten in their ambiguity?
I always envied grapefruit’s enrichment in tartness unconstructed:
so bitter, but dances in our mouths with sweetness soaked
in pleasure; so alluring on the mind, but unnerving on the tongue;
so flavorful in its flaws, yet enticing in our memories –
this is what you call home.
My pomegranates do not need to be coated from honey nectar
woven in the embracement of mother nature: Supremacy,
untampered; tenderness, unparalleled; perfection, unquestioned.
All I need is for it to purely be.
I can handle sour charms, the sting of strange aftertastes.
But a rotting, decaying birthright is fatal. My bittersweet memories –
promised to me, and signed ancestrally, will satisfy my dying appetite.
“Lost & Found”
Song credits: D’ahja Stanley (Vocals), Nathaniel Keller (Saxophone, Production), Manuel Valcarce Mascetti (Keyboard), Tony Slingerland (Bass), and George Mac Devitt (Drums)
“Lost & Found” by Shamu W.
I’ve been led to believe
that if I wanted something to happen,
it would just because I worked for it.
But now I know
Just how wrong they were.
It was all a lie.
I’ve tried to swallow my pride,
Hold my head up high,
And push past any doubts that form in the process.
It hurts to breathe or even think,
Knowing I’m trying my best—
Yet there’s no one there to console or comfort me.
I want to say I’m proud of how far I’ve come
but I don’t think I’ve ever felt satisfied with myself.
I wonder why that is…
It’s not because I’m being hard on myself,
I like to think it’s because I want to be humble.
But what does it mean to be humble?
Am I even visible?
What happens now?
I’m afraid that I’m not good enough.
Here I stand,
before a group of cynics and well—
It feels strange.
On one hand,
I know they’re waiting for the moment I fail
The moment where I stumble and fall
But even when that does happen—
Should I crumble before them?
Truthfully, the answer hasn’t presented itself yet.
I look amongst the sea of people
Hoping someone will finally see my efforts
Appreciate the work I’ve put in
But it feels impossible.
They say to follow the signs,
But what if those signs are sending mixed signals?
I think the problem is…
I’ve been yearning to be found—
Without realizing all I needed was myself.
I don’t need to find my way yet.
I’m fine taking the long road.
Isn’t that what life’s about?
So yes, I may be young
and yes, I may be lost.
But sometimes it’s better to find my own way.
And who knows,
maybe I’ll finally be able to look at myself
and feel a sense of accomplishment.
Because after all,
Isn’t that what life’s about?
“enough”
Song credits: Brandon Spendlove, Isaiah Javier, Justin Wang, and Xinyu Wang
“enough” by Mahdia Tully Carr.
If to you I am not good enough
but to them I am the standard,
if to them I am too dark to be pretty
but to you I am beautiful.
If I cannot fit inside the boxes that
everyone tells me I have to fit
in, then am I nothing after all?
It’s unfair that being exactly who I am, how
I was born
isn’t enough. I have to
hide behind ideals I can never reach
to be the person the rest of the world wants.
But the world is indecisive, and
I can never be what everyone wants.
I can never be good enough.
When will me be good enough for
everyone
and not just me?
When can I stop changing myself and my body,
when can the body I was born with be
good enough for the world.
If I like it, it should be okay.
But it’s not,
and I’m
not.
