Faith, sir, we are here today, and gone tomorrow.

Host: The graveyard lay at the edge of the village, wrapped in a veil of fog that shimmered under the dim glow of lanterns. The night air was cool, thick with the scent of wet earth and old blossoms. The moon hung low, heavy, like a solemn witness to all that had come and gone.

Jack stood beside a weathered headstone, hands buried deep in his coat pockets, his eyes steady but distant. Across from him, Jeeny placed a small bouquet of white lilies at the base of the stone, her breath rising like smoke in the cold air.

In the distance, the faint sound of bells marked the passing of another hour — quiet, mournful, inevitable.

Jeeny: “Aphra Behn once wrote, ‘Faith, sir, we are here today, and gone tomorrow.’”
She straightened slowly, brushing the dirt from her knees. “I used to think that line was tragic. Now I think it’s just… honest.”

Jack: “Honesty and tragedy are the same thing when you live long enough.”

Host: His voice was low, roughened by wear — not from age, but from the weight of too much truth spoken too often. The fog curled around his legs like something alive.

Jeeny: “You sound like someone who’s already said goodbye too many times.”

Jack: “Haven’t we all?” He kicked at a loose stone. “You spend your life building things — a name, a family, a future — and then one morning you realize you’re just a ghost walking through your own ruins.”

Jeeny: “You make it sound like existence itself is a slow funeral.”

Jack: “Isn’t it?”

Host: She turned to face him, her eyes catching the faint shimmer of the lantern light — deep brown, fierce even in their sadness.

Jeeny: “No, Jack. It’s not. It’s a dance — brief, unpredictable, yes, but still a dance. Behn wasn’t mourning. She was accepting. ‘Here today, gone tomorrow’ — it’s not despair. It’s liberation.”

Jack: “Liberation from what? Hope?”

Jeeny: “From permanence.”

Host: The wind moved softly through the trees, shaking loose a few leaves that spiraled downward, golden even in the dark. The world felt suspended between stillness and motion, as if time itself were holding its breath.

Jack: “You talk about impermanence like it’s a gift. But tell that to someone who’s lost something — someone who’d give everything for one more tomorrow.”

Jeeny: “That’s just it. Tomorrow doesn’t belong to us. It never did. And yet, we keep pretending it does. That’s why we suffer — not because life ends, but because we thought it wouldn’t.”

Host: Jack looked at her then, really looked — the way a man looks at a truth he’s avoided too long. His breath clouded in the cold air.

Jack: “So you’re saying faith is accepting that we vanish?”

Jeeny: “Faith is living as though we don’t.”

Jack: He laughed — soft, bitter, incredulous. “That’s a paradox.”

Jeeny: “So is love. So is hope. Everything worth believing in is.”

Host: The fog began to thin, the faint silver of the moon painting the gravestones in soft light. A single bird stirred somewhere in the dark — early, confused by the hour.

Jeeny stepped closer, her voice gentler now.

Jeeny: “Do you remember your father’s funeral?”

Jack: “How could I forget?” His tone hardened slightly. “You spoke about his courage. I spoke about his work. Neither of us said what mattered — that we were terrified to live without him.”

Jeeny: “And yet here we are.”

Jack: “Yeah. Here today…”

Jeeny: “…and gone tomorrow,” she finished softly.

Host: The words drifted into the air like incense — fading, fragrant, final.

Jack: “You know, I used to think faith meant believing in something beyond death. Heaven, reincarnation, something. But maybe it’s simpler than that.”

Jeeny: “Maybe it’s just gratitude — for the day you get, not the eternity you’re promised.”

Jack: “You always find poetry in endings.”

Jeeny: “Maybe because they’re the only parts that feel real.”

Host: The moonlight touched her face then, and for an instant, she looked like someone carved out of light and loss — fragile, luminous, untouchable.

Jack crouched, touching the carved letters on the headstone. His hand lingered there — not mourning, but remembering.

Jack: “He used to say time was a thief. But I think he was wrong. Time doesn’t steal. It trades. Every tomorrow you lose, it gives you one yesterday to keep.”

Jeeny: “That’s beautiful.”

Jack: “It’s survival.”

Host: The silence between them deepened, no longer heavy but full — the kind of silence that comes when words have done all they can.

Jeeny: “You know, Behn wrote that line in an age when death was constant — plague, war, loss. Maybe that’s why she understood how to live. You can’t fear the inevitable and still love the present.”

Jack: “So what? Just… smile and fade?”

Jeeny: “No. Laugh while you can. Touch while you can. Speak while you can. Because that’s what defies death — not denial, but participation.”

Host: She took a deep breath, the air sharp and clean in her lungs. The fog lifted slightly, revealing the faint outline of dawn — pale, fragile, uncertain.

Jack stood beside her. His expression had softened, his eyes distant but less haunted.

Jack: “You really think it’s enough — just to live fully knowing it ends?”

Jeeny: “It has to be. Because that’s all we’re given — a brief flame in the dark. And if we spend that time fearing its extinction, we never feel its warmth.”

Host: He looked at her — really looked. And in that moment, under the cold sky and rising light, he believed her.

The first birdcall broke through the still air — a single, pure note.

Jack: “You make mortality sound merciful.”

Jeeny: “It is. Without it, nothing would matter.”

Host: They turned to leave, their steps slow on the gravel path. Behind them, the gravestones stood silent but somehow alive — not as symbols of endings, but as reminders of having once been.

As they reached the gate, Jack paused and looked back.

Jack: “Here today…”

Jeeny: “…gone tomorrow,” she whispered, smiling faintly. “So we might as well live like it’s always today.”

Host: The sun broke through at last — thin but steady — washing the graveyard in pale gold. Their figures grew smaller as they walked down the path, until they were swallowed by the morning.

And in the lingering stillness, Aphra Behn’s words echoed once more, not as resignation but as blessing:

That life, in all its brevity, is not a curse to mourn — but a gift to spend, fiercely, joyfully, before the morrow comes to claim its due.