On Time

In time, even the meaning of time
changes, though it does not. 

I used to bristle at what I imagined
was its rough touch, its interfering.

What it withheld was never the same as
what it gave, when finally it opened its hand.

And then, sometime after the middle, 
I fevered or trembled at its approach.

I used to believe it was another name for promise,
for what endures beyond fog— Time, you do 

endure. And in some ways I do, too. Ask me 
what I've let go of, what I've let befall  me.