09 June 2009

nostalgia does not induce good poetry

My life is a memory.

Ahead is only fog.
A perfect light marks the end,
But the path I must take there is unclear.
What I think I see
May be something else,
Or perhaps it isn't there at all.

For an instant
I am in the present,
Then it flashes past into history.
Instant upon instant,
Always in the present,
But only an instant at a time.

Behind me is the story,
The one God's been telling all along.
It's frozen, and in a way it's gone:
I can't change it
And I can't have it back.
Time is a one-way street.

Sometimes when I stand where I used to stand,
And everything is changed,
Longing sweeps over me;
In a way I suppose I want it back,
But mostly I wish I'd known at the time
How soon it would be gone.

I spend so much time
Waiting for the future;
I don't understand that when it gets here,
It will turn into the present,
And by the time I realize it's happened,
It'll be over.

I'm always in yesterday's future.
I'm always in tomorrow's past.
This instant,
This little instant right now,
That's all I'm ever going to get,
This side of glory.

What am I doing with it?

3 comments:

Jessica said...

Tut, tut. Posting on your blog while out in Colorado. What will we do with you? :) Actually...the weirdest thing is that last night I dreamed that you updated, and it was something about wishing, more or less, that you could go back in time. Not quite that, but a thought in the same vein. Anyway. My favorite part is/are the lines about tomorrow's past and yesterday's future.

Qtierney said...

Actually, I wrote that at your parents' house on ... like ... Sunday night or something. But I couldn't get an internet connection on my laptop, so I didn't post it until I got here. ;)

That's pretty weird about your dream, though ... I dreamed last night that Obama was deposed ... hmmm.

Jessica said...

And I dreamt there was an alien invasion. And we only borrowed 'Independence Day' from Jordon's aunt- we didn't get it watched. I wouldn't mind too much if your dream was fulfilled, but this last one of mine seems to have little probability. Whew.

Kristina misses you, but not as much as I do. ;)Enjoy the rest of your stay!