(An Epic of the Later-Ons)
In the first dawn of desire,
when the world glowed warm and close,
the Child of the Immediate rose—
heart beating on the drumskin of now,
eyes filled only with reachable fruit,
sweet and dripping from the low branches.
“Why wait,” they whispered,
“when the present kneels before me?
Why plant the seed
when the fruit hangs heavy already?”
And so they gathered,
and gorged,
and glowing with hollow triumph,
declared themselves wise.
But the Ancients—
those shadow-bodied seers
who lived half in the world
and half in what would come—
watched silently,
their mouths stern lines of older storms.
For the Child did not see
the orchard thinning.
Nor the soil, once rich,
crumbling beneath greedy fingers.
Nor the roots, starved of purpose,
curling inward like fists
with nothing left to hold.
I. The Reign of the Immediate
The Child grew into the Monarch of the Moment—
crowned in shimmering impulses,
ruling the Kingdom of Right Now
with a glittering, careless hand.
Every choice was a torch thrown behind them.
Every promise a feather burned away.
Every other voice—
friend, stranger, future self—
faded into whispers drowned
by the applause of instant pleasure.
The Monarch devoured the days,
wine running down their chin,
joy swelling and collapsing
like waves that forgot the shore.
And the Later-Ons?
They stood behind them like soldiers
never called to battle—
strong, unused,
waiting to shape destinies
never given the chance to breathe.
II. The Gathering of Shadows
Time moved, as it always does,
with the patience of mountains.
The Later-Ons began to murmur.
One whispered,
“You stole my foundations.”
Another hissed,
“You traded me for smoke.”
Another, trembling,
“What shape am I supposed to be now
that you carved me to pieces
before I was ever born?”
They grew taller
than the Monarch of the Moment.
Darker.
Colder.
Whole storms given bone and breath.
The kingdom’s sky turned the color of warnings,
and the Monarch, drunk on the now,
laughed at the darkening horizon—
until the first crack split the earth.
III. The Fall of Tomorrow
The future collapsed
exactly where the present refused to build.
Bridges dissolved mid-step.
Fields bore only dust.
Hopes became stones
dropped into a bottomless well.
The Monarch ran—
but ran in circles,
for every path was one they themselves
had severed long ago.
Every selfish moment
returned as a specter:
choices in tattered robes,
consequences with rusted crowns.
“You fed only yourself,”
the specters intoned,
“and left your future starving.”
And when the Monarch, shaking,
reached for water,
the riverbed cracked under their fingers.
When they reached for warmth,
the fires refused to burn
for one who never fed them.
When they begged for guidance,
silence echoed back,
for they had built no wisdom
to speak from the dark.
IV. The Awakening
At last,
broken by the weight of unmade tomorrows,
the Monarch fell to their knees
in the ruins of their own reign.
And from the rubble came a single figure—
the earliest Later-On,
small, fragile, unruined.
It knelt beside the Monarch
and placed a hand on their trembling shoulder.
“You could not destroy me completely,”
it whispered.
“I am what remains
when all the immediate is dust.”
The Monarch lifted their eyes,
humbled at last.
“Can I rebuild?”
The Later-On nodded slowly.
“With care.
With intention.
With more than yourself in mind.
You must plant where you once plundered,
listen where you once ignored,
and give where you once took.
The future is not a gift—
it is a garden.
And your selfishness was the frost.”
V. The Rebirth of the Future
So the Monarch laid down the crown of impulse
and took up the mantle of Steward.
They mended the soil
with patience and humility.
They built bridges
from accountability and compassion.
They tended the seeds
of the people they once overlooked.
Slowly—
slower than desire,
slower than impulse—
the kingdom began to breathe again.
The Later-Ons stepped from shadow into light,
no longer soldiers,
but builders.
Companions.
Guides.
And the Monarch,
now wiser,
spoke to every traveler
who wandered into their land:
“Care for the future
as though it were standing beside you—
because it is.
Every selfish act is a storm
waiting to happen.
Every kindness
is a sunrise
in a world you have yet to enter.”
VI. Final Echo
Thus the tale is told
of the one who sacrificed their tomorrows
for their todays—
and paid dearly for it.
And the wind still carries their warning:
If you live only for now,
you teach your future to crumble.
If you live for others as well,
you teach it to stand.
And somewhere in the distance,
where unmade paths wait patiently,
the Later-Ons watch you,
silent and hopeful—
asking what kind of world
you will leave for them
to grow into.