Midway along our road sometimes a voice
Sounds, prohibiting all heldenblustering choices

Of timbre, overtones or fashions;
Fifty years back, when I first heard you sing
I thought: “The poems I’ve written lack for nothing
But such clarity, such passion.”

With Nadia Boulanger when young, you went
Touring through languages and continents,
Collegia, festivals and venues;
To countertenor from youth’s baritone,
You made each form, period and style your own,

From Frescobaldi, Couperin, Monteverdi,
To Neidhardt, Bach, Schutz’ Sacred Concerti
Then Fauré, Debussy, Auric;
Di Lasso to “A Lover and His Lass,”
Josquin to Stravinsky’s Rake’s Progress.
Machaut’s Mass to Coward’s Bitter Sweet.

With an untroubled, easy grace and verve,
You’d fill in for a friend whose wrenched-up nerves
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