Tonight I seized a moment.
All of us gathered around,
“young green leaves promising peach.”1
I saw strings attached to us,
A puppeteer marching us along.
Towards joy, towards pain, towards age and indifference and triumph.
The first act of a play that’s played out billions of times.
But tonight I took those strings in my hand.
I said “Stop” and they listened.
I said “This moment is mine” and they relented.
And for a drawn out second we were still.
We were safe and together.
Then the strings began their pull.
But I didn’t grieve their slipping from my hand.
I settled in for act two.
1 Ray Bradbury, “If Only We Had Taller Been,” I Live by the Invisible: New & Selected Poems (Salmon Publishing, 2002), p. 41.