New York 2140

by Kim Stanley Robinson

What historic denouements are these we so rapidly approach? —Walt Whitman

I personally feel this way when I read the news and make a futile attempt to glimpse the long arc of history as it’s being made. What horrible and dreadful things we as a species are up to, andwhat crazy and wonderful thingstoo.

So no, no, no, no! Don’t be naïve! There are no happy endings! Because there are no endings! And possibly there is no happiness either! Except perhaps in some odd chance moment, dawn in the clean washed street, midnight out on the river, or more likely in the regarding of some past time, some moment encased in a cyst of nostalgia, glimpsed in the rearview mirror as you fly away from it.