Tomorrow Does Not Belong to Us

Tomorrow is a mirage,
a bird singing from invisible cages.
Everyone desires it, yet few grasp it.
We chase it like one pursues the wind,
forgetting that the act of pursuit itself
takes us further from what we seek.

Tomorrow is an unfinished poem
written with ink that never dries.
Do we not see?
What will come lies beyond the edges
of this page we call today.
There is no divine hand guiding it,
only chance—or the enigma of chance—
knowing more than we ever could.

As always, I find myself resting in the anguish
of certainty that I am not even a master of now.
Suppose tomorrow does not belong to me,
perhaps because I have never learned
to belong wholly to the present.
Life, that book we read in haste,
does not yield to those who try to decipher it.
It simply happens,
even when we fail to understand.

And yet, there is within me
a melancholic tranquility:
faith in the hidden rhythm of things.
Even when I falter, something does not.
Even when I lose my way, something finds me.
I do not know if it is destiny
or the force of living itself
to propel me forward
when I begin to doubt myself.

Tomorrow? Let it come,
as the river meets the sea:
not because it wills it,
but because it cannot do otherwise.

P.S.—This is the most optimism I can muster, my love.