  Philosophers of the mind and logicians assert that even with great empathy and imagination, as a matter of principle we can never fully understand another person's thoughts. We cannot shoulder another's pain, much as we would like to, nor can we share in another's ecstasy. Our lives are ours, and ours alone, to bear. But sometimes, we play music with others, or we dance a pas de deux, or we pass a baton in a race.
The most exquisite moment of all chamber music is the breath that we take on the upbeat before the first measure. Suddenly, out of necessity, we are our fellow musicians because they are also us. For a quarter measure, before we sound the first notes, the walls that keep us from each other are made permeable. Rilke writes, Who knows? perhaps the same bird echoed through both of us yesterday, separate, in the evening.
Can this quarter measure be domesticated? We see the same stars. We crave the same sensations. 
