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Ashley Levins
Mr. King
English 1
4th Period
6 October, 2015
The Wooden Poet
Music is a moral law. It gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the
imagination, and charm and gaiety to life and to everything. Plato. When was the human race
so brilliant as to create a living soul for the use of the unique minds? To create a new warmth in
the feeling of a familiar kind of love? I ponder these questions often, as music has transformed
me into a new form of brilliance. Music has become my basis, and I will never value indifference
toward my ability. There is no time that should be wasted on building a wall of doubts.

From the very beginning, I had this feeling that I would grow to love instrumental talent,
yet the beginning was when my doubts started to nag at me. Sometime in the second week of
sixth grade I decided to stay after school to practice music theory and strings. I had chosen to
take orchestra as one of my classes, but my decision on what to play wasnt affirmative. As I
walked up to the orchestra room that afternoon I stopped abruptly, hearing the most beautiful
sound. The sound waves in the air seemed to only consist of the deep voice, which never
cracked, as though it was made of soft, rich cream. Stunned, I peeked into the room to find Mrs.
Greer, my teacher, caressing a large instrument between her knees and wisping her bow across

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the vocal cords of the singer. Deep maroon elegance danced across my vision, my entranced
mind drawing pictures of light brush strokes that matched the rhythm of the swaying music. The
vision was suddenly swept away, and the maroon faded, when the bow stopped swaying.
Enthralled, I finally entered the room, tasting the sourness that leaked through the fine-grain
wood. Mrs. Greers expression told me that she knew that I had been there all along, and her
smile suggested that she was glad that I had been. I tried to repaint the picture of my thoughts for
her, but some things are simply indescribable.

After a while of deep words, she sweetly laughed and told me that she understood exactly
how I felt, as she and I were alike in the way we perceived music. She also explained that the
beauty who had sung was a cello, rare in its voice, and unique in the hands of the whisperer.
Hesitantly, I expressed to her that I was thinking of playing the violin, but as result of my
newfound interest, my decision had become completely boggled. Mrs. Greer had always seemed
so calm, always having an answer to everything. Lightened by my interest, she slyly said she
would help straighten out my decision, as though she had a master plan that was guaranteed to
work. Her bow rose again, and a moment hung in the air where the only breath taken was hers. A
series of notes started to fill the empty air, carrying us into a waving ocean where the entrancing
water filled my lungs. Secrets Played for hours, it seemed, folding its arms around me in
enchantment. The ocean slowly drained and silence held out the ringing of the last cord. Our
eyes met, my tear-filled ones and her wise ones. Silence was broken with her answer that
completed my decision. I would play both cello and violin. She would guide me through every
step and every struggle, just so that a dream could be fulfilled.This answer washed away my
doubts, and filled me with something entirely new hope.

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That afternoon had left me whole, and my trance followed me all the way home. The
trance encircled me as I picked up a cello I could call my own. It grasped me through learning
and performing. That very same trance walked with me through the multiple bow strokes and
plucks. Even now, it tingles in my fingers as I play Secrets. That one afternoon, an
understanding had been made between the cello and I, we were the same, and I would fit a part
of me into that hollow core of my new-found love that would last forever. Forever there will
never be doubt between the whisperer and her poet.