Wendell Berry's "The Dance"

The Dance

I would have each couple turn,

join and unjoin, be lost

in the greater turning

of other couples, woven

in the circle of the dance,

the song of long time flowing

over them, so they may return,

turn again in to themselves

out of desire greater than their own

belonging to all, to each,

to the dance, and to the song

that moves them through the night.

What is fidelity?  To what

does it hold?  The point

of departure, or the turning road

that is departure and absence

and the way home?  What we are

and what were once

are far estranged.  For those

who would not change, time

is infidelity.  But we are married

until death, and are betrothed

to change.  By silence, so,

I learn my song.  I earn

my sunny fields by absence, once

and to come.  And I love you

as I love the dance that brings you

out of the multitude

in which you come and go.

Love changes, and in change is true.