For us like any other fugitive,
Like the numberless flowers that cannot
And all the beasts that need not remember,
It is today in which we live.
So many try to say Not Now,
So many have forgotten
To say I Am, and would
Lost, if they could, in history.
Bowing, for instance, with such old-world
To a proper flag in a proper place,
Muttering like ancients as they stump
Of Mine and His or Ours and Theirs.
Just as if time were what they used to
When it was gifted with possession still,
Just as if they were
In no more wishing to belong.
No wonder then so many die of grief,
So many are so lonely as they die;
No one has yet believed or liked a lie,
Another time has other lives to live.
