In An Old T- Shirt, Remembering

I recall how it used to be
when I saw a thing: react,
jump back, touch it, think
about it, pass on, remember
or forget it.

It took an instant but now,
I don’t have that; between
the sight of a thing and my reaction
comes a second of blank time;
I do not choose
a reaction but deliberately
react and jump back or touch it
and pass on into memory
or forgetfulness.

I sit with the spaces between.
They do not soothe, and they
do not aggravate; they simply
exist and I sit there in them
in my almost transparent from age
Grateful Dead T-shirt
and new black sweats and wonder
what I should do in this presence
of one moment of purity.

It’s enough to be silent, I think.
Maybe this after all is what
we are supposed to do with
moments like these even if we have
just one of them in our whole
damn lives. This is how we live,
this is how we die; but mostly
this is how we live forever
in the gap between what happens
and what we choose to do next;

nothing, I guess, to do
but smile.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`
T