In the Downwind

From inside tortured gut.

Taut and pressed, rebut.

Time passes time passes time passes time passes

time passes time passes time passes

and nothing changes

until something changes

until someone changes.

Did you turn the light off?

Did you burn the candle at both ends?

Did you remember your father and your mother in your prayers?

Remember that time passes, time changes, time alters,

but doesn't actually do any of those things.

We change, we alter, you change, you alter

she, they, we, me, I I I I change, I alter.

Not time.

Time just moves on regardless.

Regardless of whether you do anything at all.

Regardless of whether you get up.

Time rolls by.

Time waits for nothing. No thing, person or event.

Time dictates the space we have between the light and the dark,

the morn and the night,

the twilight howls and dawn chorus.

Of course, we know,

we know we can't slow or speed up time.

All we can do is submit to it, accept it,

and work with it, against it, whatever gives you reason and fulfilment.

If there’s one thing—just one—worth remembering.

Don't dim your light for no one.

Don’t shrink or play the saint just so they can feel bigger,

if it means you suffer in the downwind

*

Thanks for reading!

Author's Notes: Poem!