As Soon As It’s Here It’s Gone But So What

for Jack and Linda Hoeschler’s 15th Anniversary
by Emilie Buchwald

“At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.
I can only say, there we have been; but I cannot say where.
And I cannot say, how long, for that is to place it in time.”

– T.S. Eliot, Burnt Norton, FOUR QUARTETS

Today
I remember it
the leap of sun on rock,
the long climb, our backs bent into it,
The thrust of heel and calf

something flashed under a bush,
lizard or snake, and thin air
sang in our skulls

Today I remember it,
a hawk hung below us,
space spilled at our feet

birds trifled, leaves of the white morning,
shed across the scattering sky,
spaced spilled at our feet
thin air sang in our skulls,
and we were silent in the music’s eye.

We weren’t thinking,
we were just there,
we were body, immediate and true,
living in the moment’s only moment,
silent in the music’s eye.

Today
I remember it
That we rose like cobras
From your twisting thighs,
That a harpsichord and violin played
The music we made with our bones,

That there was snow clotting the screen,
and in the trees a soft light
that was now, splaying the spruce
into fat white fingers. 

Today I remember it—
the snow’s thick silence
stilling the traffic of the world’s pulse,
the room feathered with splinters of light,
the music we made with our bones.

We weren’t thinking,
we weren’t sad,
we were just there,
body immediate and true,
living in the moment’s only moment,
the moment the poem is for.

Once I said,
I see,
Once I said,
I know how it is
I know how to live in this world.
But I was wrong. I only knew
for awhile. You can only know
for awhile, for then, not for now.

So we’ll keep it moving,
hand and heel and snaking thigh,
the hawk hanging in the skull’s
bright air,
body immediate and true,
living in the moment’s only moment,
the moment the poem if for,
still and moving the music’s eye.