“Poetry is thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.” ~ Thomas Gray

INAUGURAL POETRY CHALLENGE FINALIST

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Of Time, In Time

You dare say everything is about time,
the precise ticking of interlaced hands, moving,
         trembling and skipping just to conquer a space

before it splits into structures, monuments,
and gestures, all crumpled into ambiguous sketches
from an aged comic, yellow, edges wrinkled,
         the intention of knowing and not knowing.

Still, I would dare speak of time as a little fixture in a wall
asking for a decoration, as the distilled calm that wraps
the earth and the sky minutes before dawn, as the eternity
found in the surface of a wide-eyed glance.

I would tell you that a day is a word devoid
of descriptions or affectations, that a moment
passes and ceases with consciousness. Time,
as it comes, is only the sudden, suspended motion
         of lifting your head before the needles fall

right into place,  to puncture you,
to devour you,                              if you would

give me melodies that seep through sound,
music created for the sake of music alone,
I would hang by its threads, humming and swinging

to the sound of cradles in a night powdered with sleep,
in the wake of familiar lullabies,                          would you

give me words that dispel all the traces
of an afterthought, talk to me across the gaps
of the walls in the street, and would I listen until the silence

starts to strangle my memories, until my memories
starts to strangle the silence,                           if you would

give me eyes that stare with a million shutters,
yet another million edges that inflict these incisions,
these convictions that reveal what I hide

in the slant of my lips. Then would I recognize you,
as the child buried in my imaginings,                 would you

give me time as you would give me everything
in time, although I could only offer you this acknowledgment,
this detachment, would you give up a moment to wait

for the inkling, the impulse, the action,
if time permitted it,  you and I might understand –
you and I would never be too old for anything we dare to be,
         in time.

Poem writtenby www.bluntvoidprototype.tumblr.com

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