Time Moves Forward.

The biennial time change always reminds me of my grandfather who built grandfather clocks. He was an expert carpenter who had a large woodshop in his basement and was always building something. He also built a set of cabinets that fit so perfectly into one wall of my parents’ den that they had to be left behind when my parents moved. I sometimes wonder if they’re still there.

The hourly chiming of the clock he made for my parents, and the one in his house, was extremely comforting to me, especially when I couldn’t sleep. I’d count the chimes to know what time it was though it took me a while to understand that I wasn’t supposed to count the beats of the Westminster chime that played first and would sometimes be very confused that it was…nineteen o’clock?

What really fascinated me, though, was the dial that moved between a ship on the ocean, a deer in the woods, and a face that, I thought, was supposed to represent the moon. Every time I looked at the clock the scene was different, even after each section became familiar to me.

A lot of people complain about the time change, though getting an extra hour of sleep in the fall is a lot more popular than losing it in the spring, but I like the changing of the clocks. It reminds me that our way of dividing up time is arbitrary but time itself keeps going forward.

Here’s a poem I wrote a long time ago about the change.

Daylight Savings Time

It’s over. Time to crank the clocks back an hour

And face the fresh week with a little more

Sleep. An hour to live over, to wince in the light out

Earlier than before. I have to wait

A few days until morning’s dark again wraps the house.

I march to shed sleep’s robe with a quick wash

While the digital clock’s bright gash

Fades into a faint red nimbus.

 

The hour went as quickly as it came

And added a trace of storm

To my hair. My legs rebel at the thought,

With pain, of lifting me out

Intro this light. It’s made me a witness.

 

A life is composed of hours.

Unwatched they collapse into years

And in a moving moment condense.

The leaves talk against the window in this bright

Wind. Movement, all of it, can’t separate

From time, but the fall of day has a taste

Of denial, a wrinkle that wants to be missed.

Dawn wicks away night’s flesh and color

Until it’s only a skull bleached

By the cold. In an hour that never

Happened blood surged through skin touched

By time turning backward. My hand

Slid that hour through falling sand

And like a dark red worm from my chrysalis

I come into a desolate place.