There are a whole mess of riddles about it. And it, as the subject of discussion, is most certainly bold. So much so, as to constantly and relentlessly interject itself in all we call human life. Anywhere. Any place. Any time.

Every moment or happening or glimmer of whatever, it stands over you. Us. Tenderness and grief to the grandest moments of glory, no matter how foolhardy. It looms and broods over us. As though we spawned ungratefully from her depths. And perhaps we did.

And oh, how ever fleeting she is! I dare say more so than young love and the like. In fact, the latter does not occur without the situation of the former. Power in impermanence and such. For the teenage heartthrob and blind old woman get fucked by time alike. At least eventually.

But what a bum be I?

Preaching as though I were able to wish away the fading hours. As though through intention and half-pretty words, I could sculpt, bend and break the passage of time. And as a writer? All we can do is dress it up. Metaphorical time machines are grand and all, but they don’t actually work.

So, the conundrum occurs again. I am left to wonder why in an existence of constantly diminishing time, I choose to sit here and do as I now find myself doing. Habitually. Though never too methodically.

It plagues, at the very least, the mind of your humble narrator, as well likely many more. And it may just be what little foolishness remains in a slowly weathering soul, but the compulsion to challenge the universe’s status quo is real. Fist-a clenched and eyes stuck staring. Defiance, of some sort. For it was a fool who started this, and a fool who does it still.

And a fool who is tiring is quite an interesting thing. For I cannot say that we will ever totally tire. Not as long as some foolishness remains. To tire, you must give up. And it is the damnedest thing for a head all full of waking dreams and ambition to ever let them all go. Even if pursuit has failed, most folks hold onto the whispers. Many a-times without even knowing of their presence. Always there. Until the day your body starts its turn to rot.

But here I go again, posing the ponderings of my mind upon thee.

And here I go wondering other ways.

Against some things I’ve said, even but a moment ago. Running my fingers again, without premeditation or the like. And damning the very method which I employ. For writers, indeed do have a little handy work available for time. Sure, sure, there’s always the personal transportation to other dimensions of varying similarity and difference you get with the written word. But there’s a bit more beyond that. A good bit. For if you get into one mind, you can do a little. But if you get in boatloads of them, you can change behavior. Even if just a little. Or even across whole populations. And though I always hope for benevolence, anyone with half an attention span can spy the sinister uses.

But I say the grand outweighs the gory. And if nothing else can make more out of a future, particularly for humans, it is hope. Not quite desire and not quite fantasy, hope is one of those infatuating mysteries we cling to, vaguely or specific. Hope can put fight in a soul as no other thing quite can. And that alone, is often enough to mold the shape of time yet to come.

And it has never been fully efficient. If it were, it would likely be something else. Its flaws make its strengths. It is a mix breed of emotions, bending persuasion and action. And alive! Hope grows and slows and follows us all around. Even when seen only as a specter of disappointment.

So.

Do we dance?

Or do we die?

For we all will fall. Down, in love and asleep.

No matter what intention is put up against it, someday and somehow our asses, collective or solo, will hit the ground. And there isn’t a thing in the world wrong with that. The only problem is in not getting back up. And even that is acceptable for a time. Granted your eyes be fixed upon something celestial up above.

Because I know I will fail. I have before. I may even be failing with each passing word. But. There is always the chance that I may not. Or that I can delay the fray of voided success. There is always the chance that some sort of lovely fever may live in me, for a time. For as with failure, I’ve had that as well.

And not even in some hazy distant past. Something beats in me now. And though it always has, its temperature has risen. Combustion is roaring to promote the almost haphazard pursuit of what some may call the good things. Grasping at what moments I can before it all slips away between my fingers.

Because I know myself. I can live a very long time off only a moment or two. But it must be quite a moment, of course.