What possessed us
to be so calm,
the frigid ocean below
about to take us in its jaws?
We were not extraordinary men,
not particularly religious men,
but when our minds
saw what was coming,
we gathered as one
and began to play.
A friend had told me
how once after his orchstra
played the Pastoral Symphony
the members had to shake their heads
to dispel the notion
that they were in the middle of a forest.
So we all were seized
by a great calm,
already not of this world.
The music became a bridge
over the waters,
over time and space,
over what we know as death,
which still you walk on
as you hum the melody.
Max Reif
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/nearer-my-god-to-thee-2/
