Quite a while, I thought.

There were other things to do first. A wife to heal, a kid to send to school, a house to finish, taxes to pay, trips to make, furniture to buy.

Maybe a war to fight at some frustrated desk.

But then

the future didn't belong to me, anyway.

It doesn't belong to you.

It belongs to our children and their children; to God—whom I call instinct—whom you may never call or call upon—or whom you may prayerfully confuse with your own good opinion of yourself.

Look and see.

I went down to the Knight's Bar alone.

I was hungry.