It's This Time Thing, Again

Some say it’s a calendar date,
so is it simply a pad of paper
with each day marked off as we go?

Some say it’s a segment of a long line –
a piece of string – and this day is just a fragment.
Some days are stretched, and others just come unraveled.

Some say it’s a wheel, like a bicycle tire going round and round
fall, winter, spring, summer, and repeat it please
until you die.

Some say it’s a merry go round, carved animal figures
going up and down and round and round
until the music stops.

Some say it’s a long, s-l-o-w slide
from youth to old age,
with graying hair and wrinkles marking the years,
especially now that I HAVE gray hair and wrinkles,
making it easier to mark the passing of time.
Yet, isn’t the “slow” moving faster now?

Some say it’s a growing and a changing
and an expansion of spirit and life.
better, not older -- wiser, not longer, in time.

And, I think they are all right
and all at least partly wrong;
(age giving me the right to accept, reject, and modify
any idea that comes my way.)
Each day is a gift, to be opened and enjoyed,
in the moment, pleasantly surprised.
Yet, it is not taken for granted, and there is the potential to be savored,
realized, and enjoyed to its fullest,
like a good bottle of wine, or today’s sunset,
or dinner with a wise and dear friend, or even the purr
of the cat asleep on my lap.

--Neal Lemery 10/2006