for 2008

all moving forward also may retreat
a thousand years do not teach us a lot
and so much has already been forgot
no matter efforts taken to repeat
truths half-forgotten in the cold or heat
the journey's never taken at the trot
but we will make it sober one or sot
for all are marching to the selfsame beat
a time to pause and then to take account
of what's been learned and what is left to know
but then to march out to that very drum
we never learn the whole past to surmount
yet have a sense of where we need to go
and what at bottom is the proper sum