imagine looking back
each moment passed
as one tear
              marking one current
              through an ocean
              of vast possibility
                               a whole current
                               marked by tears
                               leading precisely here :
each tear     impossibly                                            each tear present
from the exact moment it passes                       only in the moment
far behind                                                                      of its passing
and ahead                                                                      and already
not a tear in sight                                                       fathoms away

+++++

imagine instead each moment
cut
through a dense tangle
of undergrowth

     1. the violence necessitated by density
         by sheer
         proximity
         to clear and to mark
         one’s passing

     2. what is lost to the slack
         of one’s memory wound tight
         around not the subject
         but an aspect
         a mere suit of resemblance
         the rest just tight enough
         to hang on

+++++

or instead imagine darkness unfathomable :
each passing moment
alights and disappears
in an instant
a streetlamp on a freeway
       poof!
‍miles behind. imagine
a whole lifetime of lamps
shining into the void
as if to shout
       I was and am
       and will be here!
‍imagine the silence
of such a space! or
if not imagine
that chasmic echo! everywhere
shouting back
       be here!
‍imagine opening your senses
to it all! your soul stretching
full
of all the light
that was
and yet may be!