Just Now

I can only hold onto this moment for just so long.
It is hot, hot!
And sometimes I am blessed it seems,
Or cursed perhaps as well
With how quickly “now”
Is always becoming “then.”
 
But it is not then and gone, no, there is a wane:
And it is a gift when the hot now is love
‘cause hot will keep me warm then,
Long into the cold shadowy night,
And something I can circle back to,
As it cools
The touchstone after the fire has faded.
 
But it is not always then and gone, no,
Which is a clear curse when hot is hate,
‘cause hot hate will haunt me,
And taunt me toxic now
And burn me as it cools, then.
It is something that circles back as it simmers
A stain that is never scrubbed clean
A regret that begets regret.
 
 
So what to do, what to do?
Since there is no sure way to quench the hateful heat
But only to let it cool in my own entropy
Nor to feed an endless fire of love,
As much as it is my desire…
So I will greet such heats with a small wry smile:
Hello!  And there you are!
I will greet them in this moment
This only one
Like the heat of the sun
So constant and so god-like…
(As only in my life does the sun’s heat seem to come now,
And go then.)
This is know, this I know…
And this moment is hot!