In the Time I Have Left
by Robert M. Katzman © January 19, 2022
There is so much light
I want to experience
I have grown to
Love my friends
Because Time
Like flame
Both destroys and distills
Transforming
Those who remain
Into crystal
Transparent
Beautiful
And
So fragile
I want to feel
The invisible
Sensuality
of
Air flowing over me
Both the warm moisture
of the
Red Sea
at the
Tip of Israel
The crisp earthiness
of
Dying leaves and successive
Waves of Mountains
In
Vermont
I want
The lines in the
Highways
To disappear under
My speeding
Black wheels
As I race to
Every
Art Museum
In the world
Driving over oceans
Seeking Time
To wait
Wait a few more moments
Just for me
I want to
Feel the embrace
of
Disintegrating Barns
Shafts of light
Piercing the interior
As if under assault
by the
Spears of Spartans
Centuries of
Wooden walls
So dry
They seem to
Suck the life
From my flesh
I think Sleep
So unwanted
in my youth
As if dipping
One’s Toe
Into a frozen stream
Grows with me
Within me
Its power such
As Time
Unwinds
It steals Books
From my hands
They fall on my chest
But soundlessly
Sleep interrupts
My Movies
Conversation
Ambition
Becoming a closer friend
Than
Any other
It whispers
I know what you need
And it flows
Into my veins
More and more and more
As I age
By the Time
I die
Sleep and Death
Have intertwined
So often
One foreshadowing
The other
That fear of it
Becomes
Incomprehensible
How can
Something
So much like
Something
I’ve loved for
So long
Sought in my grief
Tasted for decades
Nestled in relief
Be so different
From that which
I will never
Awake?
(Written in my sleep on a Wednesday at 5 am, so disturbing I awoke to write it down, all 312 words)
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