"Hope..."

Follow the flow

My friend John and I were talking.  He said,

 

"Hope! That little chimera has had less and less appeal to me over the years..Hope..Hopelessness..Oh just get on with it! I have little truck with hope. You are here. What do you want? Just get on with it...Mr H is not only a thinker; he also likes to think of himself as a Mon of Action."

 

This began to meander through my mind.

 

"Hope..."

 

When we began

Hope had a different meaning,

tomorrows were soooooo far away

and the unknown beckoned.

 

Some were anxious - even afraid,

some couldn't be bothered,

and some knew all the answers...

 

How would tomorrow be?

What would tomorrow bring?

What new adventures would we face?

What horizons could we cross?

 

We barely had a clue

of what we wanted -

to do

to be

and even how to be.

 

Hope... we would-

touch our stars,

find our ways,

be loved,

share our lives,

have families.

 

Hope... we would -

discover our callings,

make the choices,

do memorable things,

be listened to,

be remembered.

 

Hope...

I guess as time continues

we have less future left - for us.

Our tomorrows are here soooo fast

that they become our past -

before we take our next breath.

 

Our tomorrows continue -

faster

faster still

until reaching a new

meaning -

Hope... we do -

or perhaps that we don't

...have a next breath.

 

Chris

Author's Note

Feel free

Reviews

[Kristin Lee]

I can relate to this one. The ever pervasive, permeable and ever changing piece of our shadow we all have...hope.

[Frieda P]

I understand this fully, sometimes hope is a four letter word.

[Coyote Poetry]

Hope is all we have sometime. I work hard for family and I pray and hope they have opportunities for a good life. World is going crazy. We must be strong and hopeful for the family and the world around us. I enjoyed the thoughts in the poem. Thank you for the excellent poetry.
Coyote

[Emily B]

my hope has feathers

[Tina Kline]

I really enjoyed this poem. So true, and kinda sad at the end because its the truth.

[Dana Alsamsam]

i enjoyed reading this very much because i think i'm at a junction in my life where the tomorrows aren't so far away, but the tomorrows aren't too close either. some days i have hope and some days i don't. you've laid out the two sides so brilliantly. this whole piece has an air of wisdom and the bittersweetness of age. i love this piece very much and admire your writing style; thank you for sharing!

[Penlady]

Hope is a word with different meanings at different stages of the game of life...when young I had Hope I would sing on stage...(I did, at my school dances and only saw that answer to hope as a small part to a hoped for bigger picture) further down the line, I kept hoping to be a published author...(wrote for our local newspaper, published in a local county history, and my poetry is read,(still a swimming fin in my own small pond)...being given a place as mom in two entirely separate families and loving my place and providing love, filled my hopes to overflowing...now I am alone again and beginning over...(of course with my large family off doing their own) and my only hope is that things go pretty much as they are now, getting to know people who have the same inspiration to write as I have and take the time to do it, thus more hopes are shared and grow...your poetry Chris, has grow by leaps and bounds in its tributes to your and others HOPES! You have never slid back, always there as a comfort and a gift! Bravo!

[.]

:: a very intriguing piece of writing... i think hope is a very rational emotion... :: i can't predict the future and so i hope for the best... :: i don't assume my future will be a manifestation of the worst worst-case-scenario... :: but i also know that my perspective is not a popular perspective so i usually hope silently... :: i don't want to infuriate anyone by being openly hopeful... :: hapiness and dreams are not in vogue these days... :P

[Emerald Seas]

Well doesn't this just make us all giddy about getting older (as if the vertigo and dizziness wasn't enough already). I think we settle into what means something to us as we get older, we know what to spend our time on, and with whom. Some become grumpy, some melancholy, and still some more spirited as the weight of all that other stuff gets put to the side. Hope... individually defined I suppose?

[Chris]

chuckling here...

[Emerald Seas]

Happy to provide a moment of amusement :)

[Penlady]

Que Sera, Sera! Your profile is perfect and lovely AND your description of HOPE is more than perfect...BECAUSE you have exclaimed within a framework of what is the most important...a sense of humor that results in the profound...I must read your work...glad to have found you here...I might have know...Chris draws the best to himself...with HIS best always..

[The Rock And Roll Cowbo..]

As we get older our views and perceptions change... some call it getting wiser, some call it getting uptight.