Voice Break

Following the advice of a community college music instructor, Kari Wergeland began taking voice lessons with a respected teacher at the age of 24. After roughly two years of study, with dubious results, she decided to stop singing. She began working as a librarian and eventually turned to writing newspaper articles, fiction, and poetry. Twenty years later, and on something of a whim, Wergeland enrolled in a workshop called The Natural Singer, with vocal coach Claude Stein. Inspired to resume voice lessons, it wasn't long before she discovered her singing had changed. Voice Break is a long poem of possibility that tells the story of the author's voice. Within this text, a shorter poem titled, The Next Mountain: a Riddle, becomes a key to the entire piece. Can you guess the answer?