A Despair We No Longer Believe

Day arrives as light on ruins,
Much the way Valéry observed,
As reasonable rejection

“Of all that does not yet exist”—
Much the way, but not exactly.
We would like to paraphrase this,

To reject any bit of “yet.”
What’s not yet will never exist.
We can imagine the ruins

Of everything left of what was,
But those are not the real ruins
Of anything yet to be wrecked.