Could Have

No crochet today. No knitting but poetry. Usually, I am not drawn to poetry at all but since I read Wislawa Szymborska’s Could Have* the other day, I can’t get it out of my mind.

Sometimes it takes only a split second for a life to change and if days weren’t packed the way they are I would (should?) give this some more thought.

It could have happened.
It had to happen.
It happened earlier. Later.
Nearer. Farther off.
It happened, but not to you.
You were saved because you were the first.
You were saved because you were the last.
Alone. With others.
On the right. The left.
Because it was raining. Because of the shade.
Because the day was sunny.

You were in luck — there was a forest.
You were in luck — there were no trees.
You were in luck — a rake, a hook, a beam, a brake,
A jamb, a turn, a quarter-inch, an instant . . .

So you’re here? Still dizzy from
another dodge, close shave, reprieve?
One hole in the net and you slipped through?
I couldn’t be more shocked or
speechless.
Listen,
how your heart pounds inside me.

* taken from “View With a Grain of Sand” (trans. Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh, New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1996)

A wonderful (willful) weekend to everyone out there.