I have been asked by the Juilliard String Quartet to write a fifteen- to thirty-minute composition for their 2013–14 concert season. The piece will have five movements, each referencing a certain poetic text, and will explore the spiritual and literal dimensions of religious mysticism and symbolism, as embodied in certain poetry: Yeats, Aquinas, Lamartine, etc. To achieve this, I intend to wed musical aspects of these texts with luminous microtonal harmonies, in hopes to create a sonic embodiment of their unspoken, spiritual “meaning.” In other words, I intend to create a sounding board from which the sentiments of the texts, without actually being spoken, can freely resonate in the listener. For this I plan to transcribe and orchestrate samples of the human voice—inflected speech, sighs, and song—so that the music flows directly from the sinew of genuine human expression.