Only Now
BY W.S. MERWIN
We thought we would recall the single place
we had set out for and forget the rest
but it is the going we remember
it is the way that comes along with us
and no one else now and the place
we set out for was not there even then
it had already been forgotten there
yet we remembered the river we crossed
the stone bridge and the old trees where it left us
and the small bluebird above us with its
hidden nest to which it was bringing back
what it had found where did we go from there
nothing we saw then ever had a name
and the river flowed on behind us.
