Tiny Desk Competition Submission-- Lily Talmers "Birthday Song"

Live at Saints Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Brooklyn, New York
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Music and lyrics by Lily Talmers (lyrics typed below)
String arrangement by Benjamin Green
Giancarlo Latta- violin
Sammy Andonian- violin
Nicholas Gallitano- viola
Raffi Boden- cello

Sound engineering by Geoff Brown
Videography by Sara Laufer and Evan Parness
Video editing by Sara Laufer

LYRICS:
Mother and child cradle me in a memory of newness
Heavy, I open my arms as I turn to see
It was she all along who’d been casting the mystery of darkness
And me who was woken too early
Still caught in her dream

Please excuse the wholeness of my offering
If I’m unworthy, lord
I swear I’ll fake it good

Much of your touch is like smoke in the way that it billows
Dissipates lovingly as it folds into the sky
Finding a music that longingly waits for an echo
It falls to a sea that transforms in the blink of an eye
Please excuse the hardness of my softening
If I’m unworthy, Lord
I swear I’ll fake it good
— melody bleeds into solo section of “new light, a blessed child” from end of Hope is a Human

Here I’m stuck inside of my hope as if time’s barely working
One cannot kiss sense into someone’s sweet lips to the grave
The last I had heard of your love it was inside a vacuum
But mothers will carry their children along all the same
Please excuse the hardness of my softening
If I’m unworthy, Lord
I swear I’ll fake it good
Please excuse the wholeness of my offering
If I’m unworthy, lord
I swear I’ll fake it so goddam good