You seem to be
inevitable to me
like a memory of the future
I was and will be with you
Over and over again
I keep tasting that sweet madeleine
looking back at my life now and then
asking: if not later then when?
It’s taken me all of my life
It’s taken me all of my life
to find you
You unlock the past
So many scenes moving fast
At last the right conclusion
or at least a sweet illusion
Over and over again
I keep tasting that sweet madeleine
looking back at my life now and then
asking: if not later then when?
It’s taken me all of my life
It’s taken me all of my life
to find you
You seem to be
a perfect memory
of the future reminding me
how life is meant to be
2011. I thought I’d dreamed up the phrase ‘Memory of the future’ but then I discovered there’s a book of short stories by a Russian writer, Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky, called Memories of the Future, which I’ve never read. Had I seen that somewhere, noted the title and then forgotten about it? I like the paradox of something that hasn’t happened seeming so inevitable that it already feels like a memory. The taste of sweet madeleines is famously what provokes the narrator’s memories in Marcel Proust’s sequence of novels (which I’ve also never read).