Oh, What Songs of the Heart
286

Text: Joseph L. Townsend (1849–1942; LDS)
Music: William Clayson (1840–1887; LDS)
Tune name: SUSAN

This hymn focuses on a single ecstatic vision: the reunion with loved ones in the life after this. No matter what our suffering has been, no matter how many loved ones have preceded us in death or how many remain behind, all will be restored one day in a joyful reunion, not only with loved ones we knew on earth but also with our “heavenly parents.”

As they so often did when they were colleagues in the Payson, Utah, Sunday School, Joseph L. Townsend and William Clayson collaborated on this hymn for a specific purpose. When J. Spencer Cornwall solicited some information concerning the origin of this hymn, Joseph L. Townsend

replied that the hymn was “an inspiration intended to throw a brighter light on some of our doleful funerals” (Stories of Our Mormon Hymns, 75).

The joyful words of this hymn express a profound faith in life after death. Not only does life continue but our individual identity is eternal as well, as are our relationships with the loved ones we have known on earth. And these loving relationships can be even more serene and joyful than they were on earth, because this time we have met “ne’er to part.” The dangers and vicissitudes of earth life no longer will threaten.

These thoughts would indeed be a comfort to a grieving family or individual who must endure, for the time being, separation from a loved one.

The hymn first appeared in the Juvenile Instructor in 1879 and then was included in the Deseret Sunday School Song Book in 1892. The tune name, SUSAN, honors William Clayson’s wife Susan Moulton.