The Timeball
The Timeball
sits atop of a tower
at Point Gellibrand - a quaint
relic of the past when,
well over a century ago,
ships at anchor in the Bay
would set their chronometers
as the ball descended
at precisely 1pm each day.
The Timeball is still in use
though not for its original
purpose but to serve
the curiosity of the tourists.
I often sit there
and watch the spectacle,
the ball lowering at 1pm,
check my phone time to see
if both are in sync - they
always are. I think
of the seafarers who navigated
the high seas with instruments
tuned to its time. They are all
gone now, exist only in old
photographs hung in the local
maritime museum.
The Timeball survives and I
wonder whether if they,
like me in darker moments,
saw it as a slow guillotine
slicing yet another day
off their lives.
I wonder too if they, like me,
looked out over a wider
world beset with strife,
saw the Timeball fall as if
counting down to some
uncertain catastrophe
gathering somewhere ahead.
For them it was the horror
of two world wars.
For me and my age it is
that thick, sulphuric mist
spread out on the horizon,
still shapeless and yet drawing
ever nearer and will not stop.
Its menacing advance measured
day by day at 1pm
when the Timeball drops
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