Advice To A Young Time Collector

By: Delbor Greebies

Collect seconds in fistfuls, son;
fill your pockets.

They will sift for years;
dreaming in beds;
scratching your bottom;
forever on holiday in Bath;
lining the back of drawers;
huddling in corners of old envelopes;
can never get rid of them,
will never want to;
probably have a pinch
right in front of you;
savouring;
angel snuff.

Minutes can be kept in jars.

Offered to friends
at odd moments,
ageing well
but often forgotten;
getting sticky,
lying in open air;
solidifying
into conglomerates
of fifty nine lumps.

Hours are long,
taking up space.

I recommend:
ironing them flat;
rolling up
into tight spirals,
– the sort to be found
disguised as napkins
in Parisian restaurants -;
conserved in vinegar;
candied; unrolled privately at night
during immeasurable forgotten insomnias;
some hours make pretty decorations,
others functional frames
for memories.

If I were to show you my collection of weeks!

Would take you days
to dust them off;
to glimpse the colours beneath;
faded,
waiting for varnish,
waiting in boxes,
piled up in my bedroom.

Big, chunky, armchair months…
Where can you keep them?

Put them in storage;
check – every thirty days
or so –
the leather,
is wearing well;
after a while
pile them up,
one on the other,
jammed to the ceiling,
leaving strolling space;
don’t bother with dusting;
they are an investment.

The years should be kept mainly in private collections.

Still have a few
taking up much space;
fortunately shrinkage’s
built in with time;
soon will have
almost only two fistfuls,
some invisible;
snail-shells,
dragging behind,
dragging along,
as long as I am;
but some are
deflating,
hanging to ceilings,
clinging by friction.

Time is a fiction.

Scarecrow
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