Diapers and Dragons

Friday, March 5, 2010

The Hourglass


They rush forward into time, always looking ahead to what's next and where they're going, so eager to be Up and Away. Year after year I see them yearn for the After of this place, believing in their ignorance that life will be easier, that the soap-opera drama of their teenage years will turn to Hollywood happily-ever-after. I look at them from the lofty heights of my two and thirty years, shaking my head at their naivete. Youth is wasted on the young and so it is. Time flits by ever faster as day after day slips through my fingers in a sandy rush, trailing behind me across hills and valleys, plains and bogs, the journey of a lifetime a mere three decades in the making.

My grandparents are all still living, leaving their eighth decades and entering or already in their ninth, the paths they've trod telling tales of hardship and joy alike. I wonder whether their days flow by even more quickly, if they blink and night has come again. What memories come to the fore after thrice my years? Which ones recede into the background? How does Time's fluid nature exist in their minds?

I find myself repeating the error of those youths. I am in the infancy of a new life, a new era. Yet I, too, yearn for the After of this time. In my own naivete I think that once certain uncertainties are made certain, that once specific events are made final, that somehow the path will become smooth. The reality of life says otherwise: there will be more mountains to climb, valleys to traverse, obstacles to block my way. Pain will come my way again, and the nature of that pain is yet unknown.

Perhaps this is the blessing of our blind futures. Perhaps if we knew what hardships lie in our path, we would live too much in fear to truly live. Instead we exist in our aging youth, always pitying those younger than we, always pitied by those who have already lived our age. For life is a series of lessons learned, and it is only when we learn to embrace the wisdom brought by pain while glorying in the joys that we live fully.

Yet...Time passes so swiftly. And each shining grain of sand that pours through the hourglass is lost if we do not live in the moment.
laugh....
for life's not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
--e. e. cummings

5 bits of love:

Draft Queen said...

Know what's weird? For the first time ever I just want "this" for ever. I don't want "this" to be over. Sure, I cohabitate with my ex-spouse and I'm still in school and there's stress.

But in the moments I allow myself to stop and look around I see how effing happy I am. I just want it to be a forever thing.

I know it won't be, so I'm clinging for as long as I can.

Moonrayvenne said...

Time really does seem to go by faster as we get older.
I only have my 1 babcia (grandmother)on my dad's side left & she just turned 93. She mentioned that time for her seems to speed up even more as the days pass.
We just enjoy life as we can & keep a positive outlook. (((HUGS)))

Unknown said...

1965 was a long time ago. Each day has passed one day at a time. It hasn’t been quick. It hasn’t always been easy. But, I love where I am at. I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

mom said...

Okay, time flies (as you said) and I'm late . . . but here is what was brewing in my poetry notebook when you wrote this. Heart to heart! (This is a prayer, as so many of my poems turn out to be.)

Flight of the Petals
Linnea Boese, March 6, 2010

This is my moment on earth –
may I Live it.
This place where You
have set me,
this place where you
cause your Name
to be honored,
this is my altar;
my life: my offering—
a living sacrifice,
you told me.
So be it.

I give it to You,
to honor You.
And there where I respond,
and build an altar
to worship Yahweh,
there you have promised
to meet with me,
to bless me.

I am in my sacred grove--
planted long ago by others,
all in your own plan for me--
here in the grove
where golden petals rain
with each whisper of wind.

They are in my hair,
on my lap.
You shower me
with beauty
as it dies,
a living offering,
soft, transient,
lovely in fragility,
acquiescent.

The whole grove shouts “Glory!”

Your splendor is subtly
mirrored in this place,
where green lace bursts
into yellow chandeliers:
brilliant in sunlight,
candle flames in shade,
hearts wide open
to gather in grace,
to let go and fly . . .

The yellow lands
on thirsty brown
like hands cupped
to worship in
their dying.
They fall,
lovely in descent,
gathered into carpets –
a company of many
who yielded to
the Breath of Heaven
and lit the world with light
beyond their one last
swirling flight.

You are here,
aware,
Present,
as you promised.

Beck said...

Oh, this was gorgeous. You are such a lyrical, honest writer.

My mom says that time slows down again once you hit your 50s. So there's that.

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