Bookend

Out of this now rises that future when
this now becomes the shadow we call then,
a conundrum in the clay of being
smeared by time and moulded into meaning.

Within each now a world is built anew,
complete, entirely in itself a view
of that ego striving and remaking
heart-beaten paths between now and dying

Images, sounds and sense rise up to make
a dazzling panoply, just for the sake
of preserving that teeming bag of skin
and wayward journey to that carnal sin.

Yearning nomads on the road to nowhere
we monads flee the here and now to where
our gonads lead us on a merry chase
to that inner land, our most happy place.

Words rise unbidden and conjoin to form
those chains of meaning that define the norm
by which we know the world is what it seems
and not some supernatural land of dreams.

Words rattle on the ear like passing trains,
riding rails of discourse forged in our brains,
towards destinations not of our choice
determined by some dark, unconscious voice.

The distant now that was our beginning
marked in units of our planet's spinning
will become the bookend of our season
and, between, a book that had no reason.