Take 2
I've written more sections into Metaphors for Time. I wanted to ground it further in memory. So I added some memory sections to it. I usually don't write "personal poetry", but I felt Metaphors for Time was too damn impersonal and abstract, even for me. I also felt that I couldn't talk about time without devoting more space to personal time. As you can probably guess from this extended preamble, I'm not sure whether this was a good idea or not. That's where you come in, good people, that's where you come in: How does it compare?
Metaphors for Time
Q: "What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it?"
A: "Time does not exist." -Carlo Rovelli
*
it was the Golden Age of Something or Another
surely
a Time built high
nothing to stumble over
but something to admire as background
a matte painting in an old movie
*
this ancient metaphor money was all piles
but now scattered
rhythmic
a said
sonnette
smaller than ever
these times of new form is less the point
*
what is this point
that exists in time
this vanishingly sharp end
a childerella death delay
*
they say TIME
as if they
know it is
*
I have given you
all my metaphors
and enough time
to mull it
wait
no
*
the stretching of a rubber band
fraying and frays and such
the rubber coming apart in cleanliness
until it snaps
shooting in opposite directions
they used to think of strands of spun yarn
but I think of rubber bands
for I am of my time
and they of theirs
to them
raise your spirits and say
I am the spirit of my time
*
it follows
like that dog in that movie
no matter how many sticks and rocks
are hurled towards
it slinks after
in your wake
*
helping you unravel
your mental constructions
placing you back in the now
extracting you from the embrace
of the time you spent
locked inside your brain
watching the actions of others
but unable to react
you'd return ever so briefly
much later
as if it were
a happy memory
to be savoured
*
you never give me your time
only paper metaphors for it
there is no value in things
but what we say it comes to
*
climbing apple trees
eating fruits while seated
on different branches
enough time passed
to watch the sun set
we helped each other down
guiding each other to safe places
in my attempts to overcome
the feelings of rejection
I would return to this memory
writing poems about apple trees
and fallen fruit
basing the structure
on the five stages of grief
don't judge me too harshly
I was young
and willing to throw myself
into lakes of experience
swimming in emotions
knowing full well
I'd never drown
*
how do we waste time
something that we've never
really established what is
we lack the vocabulary
*
the movie
you knew that eventually I'd return
to the movie
how can I not question
a length of time this
set
it's easy
I do it like this
*
narrative exists without time
*
the flight of an arrow
half the flight
is more than half the duration
because the missile
slows down
unless gravity compensates
I am not a physicist
I failed math doubly
though I love it
you fail the loves you one time two times
*
saying goodbye for the last time
that it meant something final
it is peculiar that
kissing in airports
feels so
unfinal
*
once you chased me with a knife
it still has an air of menace
I find myself emotionally
traveling back in time
when the memory bursts
fear mixed with love
concern blending with terror
*
memory is the negation of time
memory is a celebration of time
memory is time
memory is an inexact science
memory is faulty
memory will never supercede movies
memory is imagination
what memory is I can't tell
memory is the end of time
memory is a death of time
memory is time
*
I won't say which time
you came
I just wanted to confirm
that it could be said
that you are being
*
I have a vision
of your tears erupting
as you orgasmed
you told me
for the second time
as the drops entered your mouth
that when you came intensely
you cried
*
the only question that one needs to ponder
at this point in time
is whether you would want an eternity
of dull averageness
or a single moment of infinite pleasure
followed by an eternity of misery
no there are no other options
death is not an option
*
time is spent right
like an issue forth
that or other likes
will be grown acres
*
smoke curling upwards
dissipating time signals
hinting at conversation
*
time is never repeated
as we both learned
when we tried to
how arrogant of us
*
I remember long links of equateds
graffitied on walls and bus shelters
starting with time
and ending in sex
going through permutations of money
power
and other such nouns
*
I have been taught to manage time
yet time still riots
setting fire to machinery
soiling flesh with ash
*
the roman candle erupted
and we watched it
for a while
light on snow
sparks melting individual snow crystals
the water froze again
forming ice
instead of snow
*
you grow taller in time
your skin ever closer to my eyes
pushed up like the Himalayas
as India slides ever further in
*
the forward stream of time
split in two at that moment
I could have said
yes
but I said
no
I sometimes think of the other me
leading a different life
far away in space
but occupying the same point
in time
but you had said not long before
that thinking of such alternatives
leads to nothing
because we could never add up
the pluses and minuses
back then I studied math
though I devoted myself
to the study of you
more intensely
*
the river
an irresistable metaphor for time
headwater to delta
birth to death
but it only really makes sense to me
if we think of the river as frozen
and us skating
on the surface
*
a spring stretched by my hands
held fast to the floor by my feet
this is a way to think of time
another way would be to say
that I am a statue
stretching a marble spring
some would say
that the sculptor was punning
on the nature of time
or rather the time of nature
that time begins with spring
and ends with winter
but I agree with my time
that if time could be thought of
as having a beginning and an end
both would be best imagined
as winter
*
the rhythmic time
of seasons seems too slow
the four four beat
seems to slow
with each passing year
the rhythms of day and night
are better to dance to
spinning and spinning
moving in a circle
around a point that moves in a circle
around a point that's moving
away from the starting point
*
the order of letters
is a metaphor of time
a bee see
a metaphor in the wrong tense
the sentence with a full stop
metaphor
the book with closable covers
et cetera you get what I'm carrying on
and so on
until we come to the poem
with its lines
receding downwards
to a defined end
demarked by lack
Metaphors for Time
Q: "What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it?"
A: "Time does not exist." -Carlo Rovelli
*
it was the Golden Age of Something or Another
surely
a Time built high
nothing to stumble over
but something to admire as background
a matte painting in an old movie
*
this ancient metaphor money was all piles
but now scattered
rhythmic
a said
sonnette
smaller than ever
these times of new form is less the point
*
what is this point
that exists in time
this vanishingly sharp end
a childerella death delay
*
they say TIME
as if they
know it is
*
I have given you
all my metaphors
and enough time
to mull it
wait
no
*
the stretching of a rubber band
fraying and frays and such
the rubber coming apart in cleanliness
until it snaps
shooting in opposite directions
they used to think of strands of spun yarn
but I think of rubber bands
for I am of my time
and they of theirs
to them
raise your spirits and say
I am the spirit of my time
*
it follows
like that dog in that movie
no matter how many sticks and rocks
are hurled towards
it slinks after
in your wake
*
helping you unravel
your mental constructions
placing you back in the now
extracting you from the embrace
of the time you spent
locked inside your brain
watching the actions of others
but unable to react
you'd return ever so briefly
much later
as if it were
a happy memory
to be savoured
*
you never give me your time
only paper metaphors for it
there is no value in things
but what we say it comes to
*
climbing apple trees
eating fruits while seated
on different branches
enough time passed
to watch the sun set
we helped each other down
guiding each other to safe places
in my attempts to overcome
the feelings of rejection
I would return to this memory
writing poems about apple trees
and fallen fruit
basing the structure
on the five stages of grief
don't judge me too harshly
I was young
and willing to throw myself
into lakes of experience
swimming in emotions
knowing full well
I'd never drown
*
how do we waste time
something that we've never
really established what is
we lack the vocabulary
*
the movie
you knew that eventually I'd return
to the movie
how can I not question
a length of time this
set
it's easy
I do it like this
*
narrative exists without time
*
the flight of an arrow
half the flight
is more than half the duration
because the missile
slows down
unless gravity compensates
I am not a physicist
I failed math doubly
though I love it
you fail the loves you one time two times
*
saying goodbye for the last time
that it meant something final
it is peculiar that
kissing in airports
feels so
unfinal
*
once you chased me with a knife
it still has an air of menace
I find myself emotionally
traveling back in time
when the memory bursts
fear mixed with love
concern blending with terror
*
memory is the negation of time
memory is a celebration of time
memory is time
memory is an inexact science
memory is faulty
memory will never supercede movies
memory is imagination
what memory is I can't tell
memory is the end of time
memory is a death of time
memory is time
*
I won't say which time
you came
I just wanted to confirm
that it could be said
that you are being
*
I have a vision
of your tears erupting
as you orgasmed
you told me
for the second time
as the drops entered your mouth
that when you came intensely
you cried
*
the only question that one needs to ponder
at this point in time
is whether you would want an eternity
of dull averageness
or a single moment of infinite pleasure
followed by an eternity of misery
no there are no other options
death is not an option
*
time is spent right
like an issue forth
that or other likes
will be grown acres
*
smoke curling upwards
dissipating time signals
hinting at conversation
*
time is never repeated
as we both learned
when we tried to
how arrogant of us
*
I remember long links of equateds
graffitied on walls and bus shelters
starting with time
and ending in sex
going through permutations of money
power
and other such nouns
*
I have been taught to manage time
yet time still riots
setting fire to machinery
soiling flesh with ash
*
the roman candle erupted
and we watched it
for a while
light on snow
sparks melting individual snow crystals
the water froze again
forming ice
instead of snow
*
you grow taller in time
your skin ever closer to my eyes
pushed up like the Himalayas
as India slides ever further in
*
the forward stream of time
split in two at that moment
I could have said
yes
but I said
no
I sometimes think of the other me
leading a different life
far away in space
but occupying the same point
in time
but you had said not long before
that thinking of such alternatives
leads to nothing
because we could never add up
the pluses and minuses
back then I studied math
though I devoted myself
to the study of you
more intensely
*
the river
an irresistable metaphor for time
headwater to delta
birth to death
but it only really makes sense to me
if we think of the river as frozen
and us skating
on the surface
*
a spring stretched by my hands
held fast to the floor by my feet
this is a way to think of time
another way would be to say
that I am a statue
stretching a marble spring
some would say
that the sculptor was punning
on the nature of time
or rather the time of nature
that time begins with spring
and ends with winter
but I agree with my time
that if time could be thought of
as having a beginning and an end
both would be best imagined
as winter
*
the rhythmic time
of seasons seems too slow
the four four beat
seems to slow
with each passing year
the rhythms of day and night
are better to dance to
spinning and spinning
moving in a circle
around a point that moves in a circle
around a point that's moving
away from the starting point
*
the order of letters
is a metaphor of time
a bee see
a metaphor in the wrong tense
the sentence with a full stop
metaphor
the book with closable covers
et cetera you get what I'm carrying on
and so on
until we come to the poem
with its lines
receding downwards
to a defined end
demarked by lack