RODRIGO: Time and Time Again

Time and Time Again

Time is chewing up the calendar
it’s the twenty-fourth of Jan
and only yesterday it was the first
and I so filled with countless resolutions
saying I could and would hold back the time this year
time
a tablecloth of slippings to the floor
so undetected I hardly took a note of it
I sleep, I wake, I walk, I talk to friends
I turn and time has fled from me again
today I’ll watch the clock that’s cheating me
so quick it ticks away, it’s gone kaput
time’s different for different people
Albert Einstein
he gave us formulas for time
i cling to them, they drag me down the hall
not understanding one nor all
i won’t relent, I’ll try to hold back time
there’s time by the clock
and time by the mind
said the grand old mystic
neither could I find which was for me the real
what me things what is really real
is timeless time and its close companion
timeless death
listen to the unwound clock
quiet in its corner
tickless, tockless goings on
through all eternity

            Rodrigo Villegas is a retired seaman, born in New York of Costa Rican parents.