"All in good time"

There are many great thoughts in this poem submitted last week by Paul Robert Dinwiddie. This is his fifth accepted contribution in just a few weeks.  - poetheart 04/23/02

Time, what a precious commodity;
   And something of an oddity.
Always sought but never found;
   Always written and never bound.
Tomorrow never comes, yesterday is past;
   it goes too slow, it moves too fast.
Seasons change and children grow.
   It trickles by. Where does it go?

Time, what a precious commodity;
   and something of an oddity.
Rivers turn and mountains crumble,
   forests burn, volcanoes rumble.
Lilies wilt and roses bloom;
   frogs do leap and crickets croon.
All these things do change all around us;
   it seems that time is here to confound us.

Time, what a precious commodity;
   and something of an oddity.
The hustle and bustle of big city life;
   often lead us to internal strife.
Jobs and cars, family and friends;
   we hurry to and fro, knowing it will end.
The things that we miss are at most, I can guess;
   are those that for which we partake of this quest.

Time, what a precious commodity;
   and something of an oddity.
In the nick of time we say with a smile;
   what's a nick? Is it less than a mile?
We keep it and beep it, we measure and treasure it;
   we stop it and clock it, we share it and wear it.
We claim to own it as we slip off to bed;
   but I think it's time that owns us instead.

Time, what a precious commodity;
    and something of an oddity.
We write about it, we fight about it;
   we think about it, we drink about it.
Look to the future, it always seems bright;
   I say the present is here and it's right.
Learn from your past, we are taught in our schools;
   some say the past is the realm of the fools.

Time, what a precious commodity;
   and something of an oddity.
Always we are measuring, and never are we treasuring;
   sometimes pleasuring, but still, we are measuring.
We do not stop and bend our nose;
   there is no time to smell the rose.
Instead we spray - that's good, I suppose,
    perhaps, I say, I'll get me one of those.

Time, what a precious commodity;
   and something of an oddity.
We always watch clocks - even when taking walks;
   Geese speak in flocks, we ignore them, a goose never talks.
A chipmunk will perk it's tiny little head,
   some will toss it a crust from their bread;
Others will shy from it, filled with their dread;
   the rest will walk by it and ignore it instead.

Time, what a precious commodity;
    and something of an oddity.
It's measures by ticks and tocks in clocks;
   even in nature, it's measured by rocks.
From whence time began, we've grabbed all we can;
   from hence time will go, no one can know.
From cradle to grave, the circle complete;
   Time is the one thing even death can't defeat.

by Paul Robert Dinwiddie

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