"A POEM should be motionless in time." Archibald MacLeish
A few months ago, a batchmate asked me if there was going to be an Ateneo Alumni Homecoming this year. I said Yes and then he added, I wonder how they will do it. A good question at that time. Then last December 30, I got my answer. It was not what I expected though because it was more than I had ever hoped for. It was poetry. You had to be "there" to appreciate that definition. "There" of course meant online. Virtual. But honestly, it did not feel digital. It was more soulful. There was a lot of soul in that homecoming. Especially the dance portion. Whenever I attend homecomings, I always get nostalgic and choked up when I see former students 25 years later acting like how I remembered them. Kids. High school kids without a care in the world. Invincible. Arrogant even. Naïve. Pure.
And then to see them 25 years later. All grown. Vulnerable. Humbled. Tarnished. Different yes, but the same in my mind. And that rush of emotions gets into me and I sort of choke within. That has always been and will always be with all my students, all insane, all serious, all exceptional.
But when I saw this Batch 95 do their dance, something stirred inside, deeper than I had ever experienced. Not that they were different or special. It was not those things. It was courage. It was strength and light. It was just inspiring.
Perhaps because it was December 30, and it was the ending of a rough year. Or it was the darkness of the world. The misery, the despair, and the utter helplessness of things. Perhaps. I do not know what I felt but in that dance, I felt hope and saw light. Their hope and their light. Youth exploding in my face, youth burrowing deep. Youth that I shared. I actually cried. There they were dancing in individual windows, in their homes, offices, or wherever, all distant, all apart, and yet in that magical moment, all came together. Metaphors were flying all over. They were dancing when there was no reason to. They were back in high school again with all their inanities, craziness, screams, laughter, and yes dance moves.
Watching them seemed so near and yet so far. They looked so familiar and yet distant. They ran their courses and appeared 25 years later. They were the same and yet so different.
I do not expect others to understand this because they were not there and "there." They were not a part of it but you see I was. And when I saw them dance, it brought me back.
Back to the loud laughter of the bullseye and how far the chalk would land, the anguish of .... I think 95 knows what I mean, back to overnight sessions, back to Christmas parties, back to graduation embraces and this will never happen tears of joy and remembrance.
But more than that I guess this batch brought something no other batch ever faced. A pandemic, a perfectly good reason to fold the tent and disappear with the thought that no one would blame them. And yet they did not give up.
Because of the tenacity of some people and one person, in particular, they willed their way out of the pandemic excuse and came up with a homecoming that was poetic. It was motionless indeed because it made you forget the past and the future. More importantly, it was motionless because time could not touch it. It was 1995 once again and time stood still. They were young again.
With all their brashness and idealism, with all their roads stretched out before them, with all their dreams daring them. And it will always be poetic because of the very poetry of their lives.
Sometimes we get it right.