Trifextra: Week Ninety – The Hour Glass

Hoping that I am on a roll with Trifecta. I would like to keep it up if I can but so much to do, so little time. And, on the matter of Time and Tide waiting for no woman…

[box title=”The Prompt:” style=”soft” box_color=”#708f7f” radius=”20″]  Katherine Paterson, author of Bridge to Terabithia, wrote, “It’s like the smarter you are, the more things can scare you.”  We are looking for a 33-word explanation of what scares you (or your character).

http://www.trifectawritingchallenge.com/2013/10/trifextra-week-ninety.html

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[dropcap style=”flat”]T[/dropcap]ime with Tide, close kin:

sand runs out,

Time appropriating grain of opportunity, now so elusive

– swept past our grasping hopes.

Things undone:

prospects slipped by,

lost forever in the heaping spoil below.

 

I do not fear growing old but I am scared of dying without achieving my potential. So much to do, so very little time to do it in. If I had more time, I would do a better job of this. 33 words takes far more time and effort than you would think. It’s pretentious rubbish but it does say what I want to say, even if it fails to do it well.

Andrew Marvell had sand in mind when thinking of time too –

 

[quote]        But at my back I always hear Time’s winged chariot hurrying near; And yonder all before us lie Deserts of vast eternity.[/quote]

 

Have a great weekend and try to fit into it as much living as you can – it won’t come again.

14 Comments

  1. October 20, 2013
    Reply

    “lost forever in the heaping soil below” – beautiful, powerful words…

    • October 20, 2013
      Reply

      Thank you, very much.

      Actually it is “the heaping spoil” – intended to suggest imagery of industrial spoil heaps, of loss and waste.

  2. Draug419
    October 20, 2013
    Reply

    This is beautiful.

  3. October 20, 2013
    Reply

    this is very very well done. time and the opportunities that are lost with it – one of the scariest things in the world.

  4. October 20, 2013
    Reply

    We can’t stop or or reverse time, so yes, there is a fear of looking back and realizing we didn’t live well. Nicely done…and I think your words convey the fear well.

    • October 22, 2013
      Reply

      Thank you.

      Could you help me out of my ignorance, please? I know Tempus Fugit, “time flies” well enough but I have not seen your expression before. My Latin is very poor, I failed it at school – I was wondering if Tempest Fliget means something similar, perhaps another tense like “Time is flying” ?

  5. October 21, 2013
    Reply

    I think you said it well. Such a burden–this knowing about our mortality. Thanks for linking up. Hope you’ll stick around.

    Don’t forget to vote!

    • October 22, 2013
      Reply

      Thank you. I am sorry that I cannot find time enough to visit many other writers. I had to vote only among that set that I had read.

    • October 22, 2013
      Reply

      Thanks – it’s growing on me too, but I still think that I might have done better with it.

  6. KymmInBarcelona
    October 21, 2013
    Reply

    You had me at time with tide – watching it all wash away, grasping at the waves.

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