The Greater Trumps: (16) The Future

He is an ordinary man, but well-built, with the eye and aspect of a roosting hawk. He bears a staff in one hand, shields his eyes from the sun with the other. He stands on a cliff, and looks out to sea. In the distance are approaching ships, but he cannot see what colour their sails are, and he cannot remember why that should be important. The look on his face is difficult to describe; he is perplexed, perhaps a little angry - at himself or at another. He is a little grim as he wills himself to recall the past, but there is an openness about his gaze, about the crows' feet around his eyes, that speaks of wonderment at what is to come - and the will to meet it with all his powers.

That is the nature of this image. The Future signifies the indomitable Will, that which is armour against the unlooked-for disaster and that which is proof against the too-early acceptance of joy. Not only does it speak of the Will, but of Perspective, that sense which compares one thing against another and assesses its significance against a broader background. In many ways, the Future complements the Past; and neither is the other's inferior.

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The one thing I hope for all the future is a simple thing: I pray that God forgives us for all we have done that was grievous and all we have failed to do which would have made life better than it was before. Kipling, for all his tendencies toward jingoistic imperialism, understood this very well. Auden, for all his elegant cynicism, yearned for that healing.

In the deserts of the heart
Let the healing fountain start,
In the prison of his days
Teach the free man how to praise.

The future ends for each of us when the prison door opens. We will be free then, in that day when the words in our head say, "Terminus est" - here is the line of division.