Time’s Dead
Time’s dead. I’ve drowned it.
It’ll no longer dictate to me.
I can take a bath
whenever I choose, eat
when it suits me. I can
defecate, urinate, sweat, grunt
and sleep whenever I please;
don’t have to suffer those
damned birds clattering in the
morning. I’ve silenced the crickets.
The moon will perpetually bare
its pocked face to me,
the stars stand in perpetual,
random brightness. Except for me,
all stand like statues or
occupy some subway train, forever
waiting in that musty tunnel.
Planes are suspended in air.
Manhattan’s taxis no longer weave
through dense Park Avenue traffic.
I’m totally undisturbed in this
frozen universe, no longer intimidated
by that dictator of punctuality,
free to explore new depths,
no longer touched by death.
Words of My Father 
Jonathan (son #3) said,
3 September 2006 at 3:44 pm
The final stanza of this poem is marked “new stanza,” leading me to suspect this is an older poem (though how old I can’t say) that was revised in the 2000s. It appears in a manila folder (like “Trapped”) with markings from Fall 2002, indicating it was likely submitted to a journal for publication. I don’t believe this is the final version of this poem. If I find other versions, I will post them here. Also, the reference to Manhattan in the fourth verse are either whimsical, or indicate the poem was written earlier (perhaps in the 1970s or 1980s) since he left New York in the late 1980s.
qazse said,
12 September 2006 at 10:07 am
this seems, to me, to be about retirement..
Jonathan (son #3) said,
12 September 2006 at 1:01 pm
HI qazse,
Rather, I think it’s about loss, and the desire to no longer be harmed by it. The reworking of the poem (if not the original version) must have been done after my stepmother died of cancer in her 50s. It’s possible that the original (if it truly is older) came after my father’s divorce from my mother, or after the death of one or both of his parents.
I think the poem reflects the fantasy on one overwhelmed with pain and loss, seeking to stop it all, if at least long enough (through the power of the pen, in this case) to step away from it without losing oneself.
qazse said,
13 September 2006 at 7:26 am
yes, I see that now. I was probably projecting the retirement thing.