“A legend can just as well be founded in the future as in the past.""It's called a 'prophecy,'" Urruah said. "You may have heard of the concept.”

“Exposition: the workings of the actual past + the virtual past may be illustrated by an event well known to collective history, such as the sinking of the Titanic. The disaster as it actually occurred descends into obscurity as its eyewitnesses die off, documents perish + the wreck of the ship dissolves in its Atlantic grave. Yet a virtual sinking of the Titanic, created from reworked memories, papers, hearsay, fiction--in short, belief--grows ever "truer." The actual past is brittle, ever-dimming + ever more problematic to access + reconstruct: in contrast, the virtual past is malleable, ever-brightening + ever more difficult to circumvent/expose as fraudulent.The present presses the virtual past into its own service, to lend credence to its mythologies + legitimacy to the imposition of will. Power seeks + is the right to "landscape" the virtual past. (He who pays the historian calls the tune.)Symmetry demands an actual + virtual future too. We imagine how next week, next year, or 2225 will shape up--a virtual future, constructed by wishes, prophecies + daydreams. This virtual future may influence the actual future, as in a self-fulfilling prophecy, but the actual future will eclipse our virtual one as surely as tomorrow eclipses today. Like Utopia, the actual future + the actual past exist only in the hazy distance, where they are no good to anyone.Q: Is there a meaningful distinction between one simulacrum of smoke, mirrors + shadows--the actual past--from another such simulacrum--the actual future?One model of time: an infinite matryoshka doll of painted moments, each "shell" (the present) encased inside a nest of "shells" (previous presents) I call the actual past but which we perceive as the virtual past. The doll of "now"likewise encases a nest of presents yet to be, which I call the actual future but which we perceive as the virtual future.”

“The TelephoneWhen I was just as far as I could walkFrom here todayThere was an hourAll stillWhen leaning with my head against a flowerI heard you talk.Don't say I didn't for I heard you sayYou spoke from that flower on the window sill-Do you remember what it was you said ''First tell me what it was you thought you heard.''Having found the flower and driven a bee awayI leaned my headAnd holding by the stalkI listened and I thought I caught the wordWhat was itDid you call me by my name Or did you saySomeone said "Come"I heard it as I bowed.''I may have thought as much but not aloud.'Well so I came.”

“Have you never heard what the wise man say : all of the future exists in the past.”

“Legends that endure in the future...were events that took place in the distant past.”

“We may not have a future, but you can't deny we have a past.”