The Extra Granted Second.

The atomic clock granted an extra second,

like some miserly, downcast and heartbroken Scrooge,

it offered no extra bonus,

such as a break from the brain

and the incessant noise of Time chipping away at our lives

with a tiny hammer, sculpting the grave before

we have had chance to crawl,

nor did it shove in a half day’s rest period in which Humanity

could look up at the stars and wonder why our feet

were firmly stuck in bronzing clay.

Instead it suggested to the scientists polishing its hardened shell

that it make a joke of it, to pass away the time,

we shall talk about time

and use more of it up

by thinking what we could do in that second at the end of the day,

granted us by Time

the hammers being polished and

Time set about stealing more.

 

Being an obstinate man, I refused to take mine

at the allotted moment and added it

to both the moment in which I first kissed

my first girlfriend, my wife and my children.

 

Finding that Time hadn’t worked out what my plan was

I stole the second back and added it with pleasure

to the feeling of exhausted relief and outpouring

of beauty in which I nestled in Sergio Aguero’s goal

against Queen’s Park Rangers

and found I could relive it over and over again

like the same pumped water going round

the fountain covering the words of Roger McGough

in Williamson Square, it was inexhaustible.

 

Time had no clue,

I sat and relaxed and added to it many parts of my life

that Time became a pleasure, I was not serving Time.

 

Finally with the allotted moment approaching,

I thought long into my future and my own demise

and as a parting gift I offered myself

a second more and watched as I smiled

surrounded by the smells and texture of Canada,

the rushing mountain air, I breathed one extra Time

to beat Time before I was out of Time.

 

With a few minutes to spare, I did

what I knew I could never do in life

if not granted that extra second of Time by the clock,

I laid back on the stroke of midnight,

raised a middle, discoloured finger to Time

and thought lovingly of You.

 

Ian D. Hall 2015