Questions of Future and Past
By John Herlihy

If the future could ask questions of the past,
What indeed would the future like to ask?
If the past could ask questions of the future,
Could it stitch itself up with a different suture?
Improbable questions that could be enlightening,
Casting shadows on the present that may be frightening.
The past is already broken and cannot be put together,
The future is an encroaching mist as elusive as a feather.
It may be that they have nothing to tell each other at all,
The past has already fallen, while the future is ready to fall.
Even if they did, it would make no difference to the moment;
The past is not even past; the future has no need for atonement.

That having been said, a few questions do come to mind,
That could possibly sew up the mystery into another kind.
Where was I in the past before I was here on earth born?
Existence is a mystery, a seeing eye in the middle of a storm.
It doesn’t matter whether I existed in the future or the past;
What matters is to live in the present moment, holding fast.
The present moment transcends the limitations of earthly time;
All I really know is the life and destiny that I can only call mine.
We pretend to give credence to the mystery of the future and past;
Mistakes of the past inform us; arrival of the future leaves us aghast.
In the end, it doesn’t really matter and there is nothing of value to ask;
We live in the present moment, the here and now, alive and steadfast.