Telling Time
Editor Underground
Mitra Arianfar
They say that —
I don’t know
I don’t know that this
Youth is only a blip in time
An infinitesimal wink of an eye
That one day I’ll wake up
And reach for the air
Of my Innocence
Only to find it — disappeared
Come to the cold realization
That it was long gone
Had left — piece by piece
Moment by moment
They say that
I won’t know
I won’t feel it shrinking
That I will carry on merrily
Blissfully ignorant of the
Sand in the hourglass
And unaware of the gaping chasm
Waiting beneath my very feet
Where my Radiance shall slip away
Through the cracks in the concrete
What justified violet prose
Deepness measured by the throwing of a stone
How right they are to say it
You can see it
See it in how I,
I balance on parking lot lines
One foot before the other
And count my steps between
The cracks in the sidewalk
And hide behind my mother
See it in me
How I colour between the lines
Seated on my naïveté
While Youth and Time and Foreboding —
Linger over my days
Decay with every breath
As I wake to greet the sun
Drawn in the corner of the page
Ahead of a future in mourning
For the person I once was
I won’t know it
Won’t feel it
Retreating from my outstretched hands
In the darkness of my dreams, won’t feel it
Bearing heavy on my soul
Like a stone pressed against my chest, won’t see it
In the distance
Like some imagined mirage, won’t cry
In desperation
Scratch marks into my skin
As if grasping it somewhere within me
Would be all it takes to make it stay
No — I will not see
All the Potential
Empty spaces in the room
Or the uncanny valley
In my mirrored reflection
I will not hear the heaviness in my words
Nor recognize myself
By the sound of my footsteps on the stairs, will not
Admit the change in my gait
As I walk down an adaptation of the streets I once knew, will not
Feel it until I find myself aching for it from
The marrow of my bones
Pleading, longing, bargaining
For something that —
I don’t know