“Tomorrow is the Song I Sing”
Richard Gillis

Tomorrow is the song I sing
Yesterday don't mean a thing
I'll make today my next day's dawn
And I'll still be here grinning
when the sun goes down

I'll get through this day first
It's not the worst
I don't care
I'll be there
to put the sun to bed

Tomorrow is the song I sing
Tomorrow ragmen can be kings
The smile I wear will be my crown
And I'll be lighting up a lifetime
when the sun goes down

Course sometimes kings may ragmen be
If it can happen to a king,
it can happen to me

Tomorrow's still the song I sing
Good or bad, whatever it brings
Got no choice, greet the day
And whatever debts I owe to fate,
I'll make fate pay

If I don't make it through
It's up to you
To do your share
And be there
to put the sun to bed

Tomorrow'll be the song you sing
Yesterday won't mean a thing
Make today your next day's dawn
You'll still be here grinning
when today's all gone

Quotations from “The Persistence of Desire”
John Updike
1932-2009 American

The one new thing, set squarely on an orange end table, was a compact black clock constructed like a speedometer; it showed in Arabic numerals the present minute—1:28—and coiled invisibly in its works the two infinites of past and future. Clyde was early; the waiting room was empty. He sat down on a chair opposite the clock. Already it was 1:29, and while he watched, the digits slipped again; another drop into the brimming void.
—John Updike, “The Persistence of Desire”

“Clyde, I thought you were successful. I thought you had beautiful children. Aren't you happy?”

“I am, I am; but”—the rest was so purely inspired its utterance only grazed his lips—“happiness isn't everything.”
—John Updike, “The Persistence of Desire”

...he became a child again in this town, where life was a distant adventure, a rumor, an always imminent joy.
—John Updike, “The Persistence of Desire”

“In Praise of Dreams”
Wislawa Szymborska
1923- Polish
translated by Magnus J. Krynski and Robert A. Maguire

In my dreams
I paint like Vermeer van Delft.

I speak fluent Greek
and not only with the living.

I drive a car
which obeys me.

I am talented,
I write long, great poems.

I hear voices
no less than the major saints.

You would be amazed
at my virtuosity on the piano.

I float through the air as is proper,
that is, all by myself.

Falling from the roof
I can softly land on green grass.

I don't find it hard
to breathe under water.

I can't complain:
I've succeeded in discovering Atlantis.

I'm delighted that just before dying
I always manage to wake.

Right after the outbreak of war
I turn over on my favorite side.

I am but I need not
be a child of my time.

A few years ago
I saw two suns.

And the day before yesterday a penguin.
With the utmost clarity.

Quotations from *Platform*
Michel Houellebecq
1958- French
translated by Frank Wynne

It is in our relations with other people that we gain a sense of ourselves; it’s that, pretty much, that makes relations with other people unbearable.
—Michel Houellebecq, Platform

The things people do, the things they are prepared to endure...there was nothing to be made of all this, no overall conclusion, no meaning.
—Michel Houellebecq, Platform

“Home for Christmas Day”
from “Ghost of Christmas Past”
Cliff Heck
American

“You should have been here yesterday,” the Trailways agent sighed. “Today the bus to Pullman and Lewiston is completely full. There's another bus tomorrow at eleven...”

“Tomorrow?” I echoed. “Tomorrow is Christmas Day.”

“Yes, that's why the bus is so full today,” the agent nodded.

“But I want to be home for Christmas Day,” I insisted.

“We're completely full, everyone has checked in so there's not even the possibility of a standby seat,” the clerk said again. “Personally, I'd let you sit in the stairwell, but the regulations won't let us.”

“Great!” I snapped. “I spent last Christmas alone in Denver, and now I'm going to spend this Christmas Eve in Spokane.”

“Excuse me,” some old guy spoke up from where he had been sitting listening to our conversation. “Why don't you give the airman my seat? I'll take tomorrow's bus.”

“Are you sure?” the agent asked.

“I once ran into a veteran of the Great War, who gave up his seat on the last train to London so that I wouldn't miss my ship home, which meant I could have Christmas with my family for the first time in four years,” the old codger said. “That was, what, nineteen years ago, and I had almost forgotten about it. Give him my seat, I'll go tomorrow.”

I was dumbfounded. “Sir, I can't ask you to give up your seat...”

He held up his hand and said, “That's almost exactly what I said to him, word for word. So I will say what he said: 'I must insist.'”

“And what was your reply?” I asked.

“Very well, and someday I will do the same for someone else.”

“It's a deal,” I said, accepting his ticket.