Evanescent
Contributed by Barbara Montgomery
At seventy-five
You ask who’s still alive
That helped make the time we shared.
Living our futures
While shaping our pasts,
And finally discovering that nothing lasts.
Drifting through space
We all seek the place
Where we might stay and grow.
We’re drawn into orbits
With lives of their own
Each seeming like our forever home.
As time passes on
Each world is gone
As parts splinter off and away.
What once came together as
Our framework for being
Quickly or slowly always proves fleeing.
We might spin away
While others may stay,
Held by their bonds of inertia.
We can try to return
To the world we liked best
But find it has gone just like all the rest.
So we wait here alone
Until options are gone,
Helpless to steer any course.
The paths that we traveled
Collapsed as we passed
Revealing ahead only future now past.