After 20 minutes, half an hour, the coroner has finished his examination. Two team members lift the white body bag up over the dangling figure and zip it closed. Our tallest reaches with a sharp knife and cuts the rope. The body slumps into the men’s arms, and they carefully lay him in the litter, strap him in.

I stand on the wire fence to keep it flat. The six men surround the litter and lift it, slinging the webbing over their shoulders for support. They head down the incline, and I follow. Glancing back, I see the coroner ’s flashlight shining on the dangling rope.

At the clot of tree limbs, the men slow, lower their burden to the ground, inch it under and through. The blackberry thorns grasp at their clothes. They struggle along the narrow path, then emerge onto the asphalt trail. One by one they switch their headlamps off as their eyes adjust to the overcast night, to the contrast the trail makes as it flows between soft mounds of pine duff.

We walk slowly, reverently. It is very quiet. No wind to clatter leaves. No talk. Just our soft footfalls.

But then, from behind us, a melody rises. A trumpet, muted. Two slow notes and a longer one, two more and a long--floating upward, soberly, hauntingly, to dissipate into the darkness. Day is done, gone the sun, from the hills, from the lake, from the sky. All is well, safely rest. God is nigh.

“Taps.” As it plays, we slow to match the pace of the lone bugle. It is spooky, eerie. Beautiful.

There is an easy explanation for this haunting bit of serendipity: every evening at ten, someone at the Defense Language Institute punches a button and sends the tune wafting through loudspeakers--a farewell to the day just past, perhaps an acknowledgment of the conflicts around the world where American soldiers are at risk, and are dying. It’s one of the local sounds, along with the barking of sea lions and the chatter of gulls; a reminder of this town’s history.

Tonight, though, the explanation doesn’t matter. Tonight, we have all--all of us--been blessed with a solemn, and affirming, moment of grace. It is the hour of departure, oh abandoned one. For those of us who remain as well, it is an hour, if not of departure, then of reckoning. Yes, of reckoning. We are all touched by this grace.

Since this first call, Anne Canright has been on the Monterey County Search and Rescue team for two and a half years. There have been more recoveries, but also many rescues. The work and the team camaraderie continue to be satisfying and stimulating, and to teach ever new lessons in life.

Excerpt from “The Song of Despair” from Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair, by Pablo Neruda, translated by W.S. Merwin, published by Chronicle Books. Copyright © 1969 by W.S. Merwin. Reprinted by permission of W.S. Merwin. All rights reserved.