"Mr. Shindell said he wrote his first song, ''On a Sea of Fleur-de-Lis'' -- ''a prayer for creativity,'' he called it -- while studying at the Union Theological Seminary in Manhattan in 1987. ''When I finished it,'' he said, ''I stepped back, and the place where I had ended up was far removed from what I understood about myself or songwriting.''"
From http://www.nytimes.com/1998/05/17/nyregion/valhalla-singer-in-joan-baez-tour.html
"Mr. Shindell said he wrote his first song, ''On a Sea of Fleur-de-Lis'' -- ''a prayer for creativity,'' he called it -- while studying at the Union Theological Seminary in Manhattan in 1987. ''When I finished it,'' he said, ''I stepped back, and the place where I had ended up was far removed from what I understood about myself or songwriting.''"