“Coal and Diamonds” is a poem from Kathryn Sparks’ cycle of poems Lullabies and Nocturnes. Composer Justin Binek loved the concept of the song cycle in classical music, and wanted to incorporate that multi-movement song form into the vocal jazz idiom, and the poetry lent itself to a bossa nova rhythm. The intro and ending of the song are built around on a reharmonization of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” which plays on the “lullaby” theme of the poem.