His arched back hunched
on the planes between the sea,
the tourism-stained pavement,
and the looming concrete structures.

Someone had already
blotched the cardboard.

Time wore away
at the corners of his coat,
sanding fibrous strands down
to fuzzy, stray ends.

Inscribing the memo
posed a slight challenge:
ill take anything

Location didn’t strike him
until the plan came alive,
but rush hour doesn’t play
favorites.


His hunched back stooped
as his twisted arm extended,
proffering manners, “faith,”
and an empty palm.

Unrelenting, Time
sanded down his
vocal chords as well.

Nature dirtied
what they saw.
And
what they didn’t.

Five o’clock
shadowed more
than fresh skin.

His stooped back buckled
as his fingers ticked with turmoil.
Returning to their starting point
had left him unchanged.




They tried to tear him
limb from limb,
and shove his parts
into boxes and bags.

Flexible as ever, Time
simply stretched and sighed,
pressing on in his humdrum way.

They swore he wouldn’t die,
and then they all kept on.
A conversation never
crossed their minds.

His buckled back crumbled
as his aching hands grew weary.
Not once did they offer
to take a shift.

They chained his corpse to tow-trucks
and slammed down on the gas,
but iron would shatter
sooner than he.

Time, deserted and decaying,
acted on the sole choice:
he collected gears and cogs and
scrounged for eternity.

His crumbled back lithified
and his gnarled knuckles numbed
as he turned to the planes from
whence he once had come.