Time, Gentlemen, Time!
O would not Life be charming
Could we get rid of clocks,
The still ones and alarming
That break on sleep with shocks?
Then it would be respected
And worthier far of Man
Than when by springs directed
From gold or a tin can.
Why should Man's life be reckoned
By anything so queer
As that which splits the second
But cannot tell the year?
If we got rid of watches
The trains would cease to run,
We could not fight a battle-ship
Or aim a battle gun,
Nor tune the little engines
Which fill the towns with fumes
And send men with a vengeance
(Quite rightly) to their tombs.
If we got rid of watches
And wanted to approach
The pallid peopled cities
We'd have to hire a coach
And guard, who, to arouse us,
So hardy in the morn,
Outside the licensed houses
Would blow a long bright horn.
Our stars know naught of watches,
There's not a wind that wists
Of mischief that Time hatches
When handcuffed to our wrists.
No wonder stars are winking,
No wonder heaven mocks
At men who cease from drinking
Good booze because of clocks!
'Twould make a devil chortle
To see how all the clean
Free souls God made immortal
Must march to a machine.
It makes me wonder whether
In this grim pantomime
Did fiend or man first blether:
“Time, Gentlemen, Time!”
We must throw out the timing
That turns men into gnomes,
Of piece-work and of miming
That fills the mental homes.
We must get rid of errors,
And tallies and time checks,
And all the slavish terrors
That turn men into wrecks.
They have not squared the circle,
They have not cubed the sphere,
Their calendars all work ill
Corrected by “leap” year.
But we should all be leaping
As high as hollyhocks
Did we desist from keeping
Our trysts with slaves of clocks.
How should we tell the seconds?
The time a blackbird takes,
To screech across a lane-way,
And dive into the brakes.
How should we tell the minutes?
The time it takes to swipe
A lonely pint of Guinness,
Or load a friendly pipe.
O make the heart Time's measure
Because, the more it beats,
The more Life fills with pleasure,
With songs or sturdy feats;
Our clocks our lives are cheating,
They go, and ground we give;
The higher the heart's beating,
The higher then we live.
Could we get rid of clocks,
The still ones and alarming
That break on sleep with shocks?
Then it would be respected
And worthier far of Man
Than when by springs directed
From gold or a tin can.
Why should Man's life be reckoned
By anything so queer
As that which splits the second
But cannot tell the year?
If we got rid of watches
The trains would cease to run,
We could not fight a battle-ship
Or aim a battle gun,
Nor tune the little engines
Which fill the towns with fumes
And send men with a vengeance
(Quite rightly) to their tombs.
If we got rid of watches
And wanted to approach
The pallid peopled cities
We'd have to hire a coach
And guard, who, to arouse us,
So hardy in the morn,
Outside the licensed houses
Would blow a long bright horn.
Our stars know naught of watches,
There's not a wind that wists
Of mischief that Time hatches
When handcuffed to our wrists.
No wonder stars are winking,
No wonder heaven mocks
At men who cease from drinking
Good booze because of clocks!
'Twould make a devil chortle
To see how all the clean
Free souls God made immortal
Must march to a machine.
It makes me wonder whether
In this grim pantomime
Did fiend or man first blether:
“Time, Gentlemen, Time!”
We must throw out the timing
That turns men into gnomes,
Of piece-work and of miming
That fills the mental homes.
We must get rid of errors,
And tallies and time checks,
And all the slavish terrors
That turn men into wrecks.
They have not squared the circle,
They have not cubed the sphere,
Their calendars all work ill
Corrected by “leap” year.
But we should all be leaping
As high as hollyhocks
Did we desist from keeping
Our trysts with slaves of clocks.
How should we tell the seconds?
The time a blackbird takes,
To screech across a lane-way,
And dive into the brakes.
How should we tell the minutes?
The time it takes to swipe
A lonely pint of Guinness,
Or load a friendly pipe.
O make the heart Time's measure
Because, the more it beats,
The more Life fills with pleasure,
With songs or sturdy feats;
Our clocks our lives are cheating,
They go, and ground we give;
The higher the heart's beating,
The higher then we live.
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