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

It’s taken me all of my life

It’s taken me all of my life

to find you

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).