The Edge of Impossibility
By John Herlihy

We live on the edge of impossibility;
Life’s improbabilities there for all to see.
They lure, they lunge, they glitter and glare;
At the edge of life’s horizon, they simply stare.
Take us, then embrace us, free for the asking,
When all the while only the forbidden masking.
We live on hope that tinkers there on the edge,
A mirage to fill blurred vision like a false pledge.
Impossibility waits at the edge of shadowy night,
Light diminishing before shadow steals the light.
Our fanciful ambitions fan out like a palm frond;
Our blind aspirations ripple as wavelets on a pond.
We walk on tiptoes through a minefield of desire,
Our beating hearts burning with illusions on fire.
Now beaten and broken, shattered apart like glass;
Horizon’s edge went nowhere, still holding on fast.
Life’s end turns a corner looking the worse for wear;
All those impossibilities still beckoning, still there.