The Dreams of Tomorrow

Contest entry for Payne County Youth Services 2015, 8th annual contest. As of 12/12/15, results and placements have not been released yet. When they are, I’ll post that in an edit if I placed.

EDIT: 2/29/16: Today, notification came that said "1st Place and Best in Show."

The dreams of Tomorrow, you so say?

I’d rather dream about today

Why?

Because Tomorrow’s unsure

No disease has been promised a cure

No child was promised life tomorrow,

And oft men have prayed “surcease of sorrow”

 

If we dwell on tomorrow,

Then today is wasted

Because yesterday’s dreams

Have been cut and pasted

If you rely solely on the future,

Then hope is an illusion,

And then reality is

A most unwelcome intrusion

 

The Dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

You mean the tomorrow not coming my way?

I got hit in a car crash

They say I won’t make it

Just to pay the hospital bill

I’ll spend tonight homeless and naked

That’s not a bright dream but tomorrow it’s coming

So I’ll spend the rest of my life running

 

Running just to catch up to last week

Yesterday, today, tomorrow are distant

The doom of last week looming in front of me persistent

To undertake that with tongue-in-cheek

That’s something I can’t work over or around

And yet still it stands fast in my way

Tomorrow is a dream forsaken

And my dream is put on hold for today

 

The dream of days next

May as well be of days past

Because if you dream only on the morrow,

Then your dream will forever last

To some that is appealing

But to me it is not so

Because a dream never fulfilled

Is a dream better left unknown

 

What about the fetus in her womb?

A place that soon becomes its tomb

Because last night’s dream didn’t put him in today

In fact, tomorrow’s dream said his life was belayed

And all for what? A night of pleasure.

Nobody can support a child from that

So we abort one of our most precious treasures

Whose life, we said, wasn’t worth a rat’s

 

Tomorrow is a loathsome buffer

“Today I’m not, but tomorrow, I’ll be tougher.”

That’s what we all will say

When on tomorrow we lay

But you and I both know that it’s just an excuse

A reason to stay dead and down as a solitary recluse

It’s what we say when our friends

Need something of or from us

The word “tomorrow” is the best way

To avoid a great fuss

And when we say tomorrow,

It comes with a promise of survival

But your life may just be

The purpose of a rival

 

The enemies of yesterday

Loathe you without sorrow

So they’d kill you today

To deny you tomorrow

Car crash or abortion

Or murder otherwise

Is seen as the portion

You’ll receive for your lies

 

Tomorrow, you’ll keep up with yesterday’s lies

And you’ll see that today, you won’t sever their ties

The dream of tomorrow falls to pieces in truth

So when tomorrow you lie, and you will, forsooth

Recall that tomorrow’s tomorrow

Will rely on the words of today

So as you walk it about,

“Be careful little mouth what you say”

 

The dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

A dream that is shattered when you wake up gay

On a matter like that our world is divided

And what of “bisexuals” that haven’t decided?

Some advocate choice, another says nature

Most cry out in distress because they simply don’t know

So we leave that question up to legislature

And tomorrow’s dream is shadowed

 

A 5-4 ruling has dictated a dream

Some applaud; others simmer and call it a scheme

But what’s to be said of the American theme?

Gay marriage is pulling this nation at its seams

 

The dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

Because I punished the one that got away

The law comes down on me instead

Because I collected the real murderer’s head

So the original death was tomorrow deprived

And now the murderer that would have survived

Is allowed his tomorrow free of his crime

Without wasting tomorrow doing his time

That’s gross injustice, that justice isn’t mine

That a criminal could go free with only a fine

Like a driver with a little much beer or wine

Who killed my daughter in a crash but was himself left behind

 

So tomorrow, I won’t be at her dance recital

Tomorrow, I won’t sing with her, driving to school

Twenty years tomorrow, I won’t walk her down the aisle

And all because of some drunken fool

The worst of it is he can’t remember last night

And it’s all arbitrary anyway

Because all he does is pay a dollar or two

And he’ll live to be drunk another day

My dream was wrecked, and yet his may live on?

While the price of my blood and my tears are paid

And so the task of rebuilding is donned

And my future has just for me been made

You can’t replace a daughter

Nor can you buy back a son

The child you dreamed you might have could be your only one

So don’t waste away his life before it’s even begun

 

The dreams of tomorrow you have told me are so

Cannot possibly have been yours to know

“Tomorrow’s a new day,” you tell me now

But I could tell you now those words are foul

Take the drunkard’s victim, the gay man too

The hospitalized driver, the vigilante as well

Through them you’ll see that tomorrow was set

And the “dreams of tomorrow” aren’t yours to sell

 

Tomorrow has already run its course

And at sunrise it shall run true once more

The future has be dictated with solid force

Tomorrow is a fact, not an adjustable score

You deign to dispute? I’d call you a fool

See all these people that invent a plan?

You call it “Free will” that’s a phrase that is poor

It’s all precedented by an Almighty Hand

 

You may as well note that you will be despised

That tomorrow was told exactly what he’d hold

And I was told too, how much I’d be reviled

So my “dreams” are really planned to that mold

 

The dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

When I’ve lost all my hair and now wear a toupee

That’s something that I’d like to avoid,

A part of my dignity being destroyed

 

The dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

The forever alone songs haunt my voice

Shortly sooner, I’ve found no love today

I’ve known forever why, but ‘twas not my choice

So life has gone back down to being

Little more than a shell, hoping, believing

But soon I’ll give up hope, for my spirit has died

And romance, like coping gaming circuits, has been fried

 

But my dream for tomorrow, if it still should come

Whether greeted by rain or shining sun

Is that I and my neighbor would treat each other as kin

Whether or not who’s right, whoever has sinned

 

The dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

I’m tired of waiting, wasting away

The dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

I’ve got to start working dreams into today

The dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

It’s here and now I’ve got something to say

 

The dreams of tomorrow, you so say?

I’d rather dream about today