The Tide That Only Rises

Your world will change around you
More than you’ll move through your world.
The most exotic travel,

The most diverse locations
Are those pasts surrounding you,
Grown each decade in each place.

You say you’ve traveled the world?
Seen the landscapes, the people,
The great cities, the ruins?

You know they’re all different
Now from when you visited—
Oh, similar, some of them,

Maybe mostly—but new pasts
Creep up around your shoulders,
Soon to close over your head.