Another Poem: Time Blending

Yesterday, I wrote a Poetry Friday post on Thursday. While writing it, I truly thought it was Friday. My days are mixed up due to travel. Over the last week, we travelled home to Wisconsin from a trip to see my parents in Western New York, where they live in a small college town bordered by the famous Erie Canal.

Daily events no longer mark time for my husband and I. He retired in 2018 and I retired the following year (2019) from a very brief (nine month) return to work right after he left his job. The pandemic and its social distancing requirements have let us more easily adjust to a new routine as a retired couple. I’d go as far to say it has been an unexpected benefit of having to spend more time at home.

But when days are no longer defined by a work schedule or school schedule, they tend to blend together. Each day is a blessing, no less or no more. It is how we use those days that count not what they are labelled as being. It no longer matters whether it is a Sunday or a Wednesday.

On Being Retired

Days of the Week

no longer speak

to fill us with the

routine we once sought.

Time, you see, cannot be bought.

It travels with the Earth, as

Each rotation claims

Our day and night,

without an exchange.

Time to ponder,

Time to act,

Time to pet our pussy cat.

Being retired is unlabelled time,

that let’s you decide

what you

find sublime.

The constant of time is

not in its passing,

it’s choosing what

to do with it

that makes it everlasting.

© Carol Labuzzetta, 2021