The Art of Saying Good-Bye - May 7 2022

 

The Art of Saying Good-Bye

May 7 2022

The art of saying good-bye

as if for the last time.

As if you can't be sure

of anything in life.

And even when you do come back

it's never quite the same.

The light has changed.

People depart.

Tectonic plates shift.

And time, of course

ticks relentlessly on.

The big embrace,

theatrical wave,

fond look back.

And then you turn away

bite your lip

and steel yourself;

no backward glance

as you grip the wheel

and accelerate;

ignoring

the sharp taste of salt

that has somehow appeared on your tongue.

But still can't resist

a quick look

in the rear-view mirror

where you find you can’t turn away,

watching

as the image

shrinks into the distance

and quickly darkens.

Overcome

by this verklempt feeling

of nostalgia and loss;

a bittersweetness

welling up from the depths

you never imagined

you had in you.

Johanna Schneller began her piece in this weekend's Globe with these 2 paragraphs. (See below.) Which just needed a quick skim for the art of saying good-bye to spring into my head as as a promising opening line. After that, as usual, the poem took me by hand and wrote itself.

I'm not at all sentimental; even less demonstrative. So for me, even the big embrace is hard! But I do know that verklempt feeling. And what another great word Yiddish has gifted to English. Spellcheck is unhappy with it. But I couldn't be more pleased!

I love the collective consciousness of television and film. An idea is aloft in the zeitgeist. Interpreters catch it. Then something happens in real life, the idea and the moment find each other, and voila – we’re suddenly awash in work that is not only rich but feels especially relevant.

Lately I’m seeing so many series and films that focus on the importance of saying goodbye. Many, of course, were under way before March, 2020, but these two pandemic years, with their excess of goodbyes– and missed goodbyes – have sharpened that sweet stab of recognition.