John Anderson Poet Lyric

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The Use of Time

Time is the only gift that keeps giving
as it ticks relentlessly away.
It is an indifferent benefactor
brutally fair with its pennies.
Each dawn sees more hours in our account.
But it never checks the balance,
there is never any carry-over,
no borrowing, debt or overdraft.

Time is endless; it ticks on regardless.
Its account respects not its waste, 
nor wise use, nor measured or frivolous use.
Procrastination is ignored.
It waits for nothing
why should it?

It catches up with us
as we catch the clock face
counting the past,
which is the one tense, 
that time forgot long ago.
Time is merely a witness,
watching on CCTV.

We speak of spending time 
as though we possess it,
but it never belonged to us anyway,
it was never given, only taken,
as it ticks away.

Saving time is a delusion
it ticks away.
Tomorrow is an illusion,
a tick for another day.
time well spent
is a drip drop splat
in the ocean's séance,
that ticks away, ticks away.

Time has no use at all.
It is totally indifferent.
It leaves no traces of its passage,
which we observe in tree rings, wrinkles,
scars, sediments, stories, 
relics and memories.
Time knows nothing of such things.
We imagine we are moving through time, 
yet we are the hourglass 
through which the sands of time can move.

The past never exists.
The future does not yet exist.
The present vanishes before 
we can touch a finger on it.

The past is a recollection
future is anticipation
present is participation
time has no reflection.
Yesterday, today, and tomorrow 
all exist concurrently.

Time began with the Big Bang
the downbeat for existence.
It is the sound entropy makes 
as it unfolds order into disorder.
It is an ever expanding passage
relentless in its ticking.
Its rhythm is indifferent
to whether we dance
or simply count the notes.

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