I mark the high days and the holidays Red-letter on the page; Fast-forward into memory Prepare to be upstaged The envelopes I push against So rapidly become A wrap to keep me safe and warm But soon enough I'll be undone And if, for instance, I had spent a lifetime In the service of cleanliness and godliness I'd still be washed up now My history doesn't make much sense No corner has been turned The future's brooding and immense And everything I've learned Seems tiny in the scheme of things The reckoning's begun – I hold together what I can The stitches bound to come undone And, for example, if I'd spent a lifetime In pursuit of miraculously common sense I'd still feel stupid now I'm waiting on a final clue A final validation Of what I did, of what I hid Of all I called my own Our high days and our holidays Are numbered, every one So quick the hours rush away And everything we've left's undone