One of the WRS members, Monica Boruch, has written a lovely poem for her teacher, Gwyn Roberts. It has been published in the Spring 2020 issue of the “American Recorder”, but you can also read it below.
Recorder
I sit at my music stand with light shining on notes and paper
It’s evening and quiet in my surroundings.
The closet-sized room flushed with warm, mauve walls
Envelopes me like a timeworn shawl.
Family photos, jottings of hope and peace,
Parallel the wooden stand with recorders stood vertical.
In my sixth decade,
An unexpected gift has come to me
A drive to fulfill something. An ache.
I know I may not reach the goal I want.
Small sorrow that this did not arrive sooner.
Minding body and position. Thumb, chin, tongue, fingers, holes and breath.
Quantity, quality, lightness, weight, balance and direction.
How can a piece of wood invite and radiate so much?
With a breath, I play
Music from the fathers of Baroque.
Ornaments of trills, mordents, and grace notes
Endings of port de voix, delayed cadences and appoggiaturas.
Harmonies, dissonances, rhythms and resolution,
Flow in and over me like a gentle wave.
Time passes.
And more time passes.
Blessing. Grace.
Melding into the wood, I am there.