Let us consider life 

as a series of poems 

that sometimes rhyme

and sometimes doesn’t. But 

you can only see the shadow ahead,

and no further.  O, you think, 

my calendar is full next month.

That is only a prediction, not a fact. 

The bird flies. The kindling makes fire.

The limestone rock explodes when the kindling

on top heats. These are facts. Things you can see

in the here and now. Birds will fly, kindling 

will make fire, the limestone may burst—

predictions. Shadows. And perhaps 

you lean into shadows, lean into what

may happen. We all do. Life pushes to the forefront

the now of cells and the clues of shadows. 

Reinventing itself every breath.