Text???

I am about to embark on a journey of writing ten art songs that will be performed (soprano) and recorded. What is the best source for text? I know there's the usual Latin sacred text (Credo, Agnus Dei, etc.) and I have looked through many books of poetry, which turned out to be fruitless. Any information is appreciated!

Epitaphs are awesome, short but often beautiful and poignant. Other than that, I recommend reading any poetry that really grabs you.

So far every art song i've ever written has been to a poem by Thomas Hardy. His poems are fairly strictly metered, and many of them are the perfect length for art songs. Plus, they are great poems. Go check them out and see if you like them.

Text is a hard thing. I wouldn't actively look for inspiration like that... just check out stuff you like until you find something.

Instead of just looking for the perfect texts (which could prove as arduous a task as reading every work of every romantic poet, and then some until you find one or several that call to you) try thinking about what you want them to say. What mood or theme do you want to convey. If you can narrow your search down to , for instance, funny, and then to sarcastic funny, and then sarcastic funny wife to husband, or woman to friend, or woman in love, etc, then it's easier to focus your search before you start it.

On the other hand, I've been really entranced lately with 1-sentence stories. That is me making up a name for them, but they are basically full stories that can be surmised from a single sentence. They can also be focused into 5 word sentences, 6 word, etc. Some are horrible. Some are clearly pulling a laugh. And some are borderline brilliant and/or somewhat open-ended while allowing an obvious end. I've seen a post somewhere on YC regarding them before. That could prove an interesting course.

Set Jonathan Livingston Seagull to music.

You could always look at some Walt Whitman.

Thank you all for the wonderful suggestions! I believe I have more options to choose from now. I'm having a bit of a hard time getting off of the ground this time. I consider myself first and foremost, a composer, singer (tenor) and pianist, but oddly enough, I haven't written but only a few pieces for the solo voice and piano. I'm not going to get into my school and such since I will have all my education and experiences on my profile.

I guess simply put, finding the appropriate text seems a bit cumbersome! I worked for a couple of hours on my first song and I came up with nothing of interest... Thank you all again for your wonderful advice.