Don’t read this.
Scroll down from it like you usually do.
Well, most of you.
Unless you are one of the faithful few.

But the words keep coming.
My Voice will not be stilled.
Free verse keeps pouring
A persistent stream.

Now, though, I am haunted by this thought:
That nearing seventy I have but twenty years to live,
Thirty if I’m lucky,
God willing.

And like everyone else I hide in distraction,
Eating and drinking,
Finding entertainment,
Indulging in meaningless competition
Pointless projects
And generally playing out time.

Others do likewise,
Building great empires
Or just idling away
Those passing hours.

Yet my mind reaches out
Beyond the Time-Space Continuum
To a place where everything has already happened
Our lives have already been and gone.
The Universe as such has lived and died.

And when my brain returns
Back into this Realm
It encounters the sheer Science
Of an endless Cosmos
Endless in all dimensions
All directions
All times.

The mind is boggled
By Existence
Bringing substance, time, infinity and eternity
All impossible
Yet inevitable
Once something happens to Be.

Wherever you go
There is something further
Always a here and there.
Always a past, present and future.

Indeed, all impossible.
But I have to concede
There must be some Ultimate Intelligence somewhere
Even Sentience
That we might call God.

And maybe what The Ancients called “God”
Was but the nearest “god” we know of!

Yet don’t expect Him or Her or It
To come running
To our aid
Especially as
There may be no such thing
As an “Ultimate”
And no way to escape
From the Space-Time Continuum.

We are lost in the impossible,
So maybe all we can do
After all,
Is make the most
Of what we’ve got.

Paul Butters

© PB 12\4\2022.