Amar Saleem / Pexels

The Edges of Time

It is at the edges 

that time 

thins. 

Time which had been 

dense and viscous 

as amber suspending 

intentions like bees 

unseizes them. A 

humming begins, 

apparently 

coming 

from stacks of 

put-off things or 

just in back. A 

racket 

of claims now, 

as time flattens. A 

glittering fan of things 

competing to happen, 

brilliant and urgent 

as fish when seas 

retreat.

Nothing Ventured

Nothing exists as a block 

and cannot be parceled up. 

So if nothing’s ventured 

it’s not just talk; 

it’s the big wager. 

Don’t you wonder 

how people think 

the banks of space 

and time don’t matter? 

How they’ll drain 

the big tanks down to 

slime and salamanders 

and want thanks?

Miser Time

Miser time grows 

profligate near the 

end: unpinching 

and unplanning, 

abandoning the 

whole idea of 

savings. It’s hard 

to understand 

but time apparently 

expands with its 

diminishing. The 

door thrown wide 

on sliding hills of high- 

denomination bills and 

nothing much to buy.

Paired Things

Who, who had only seen wings, 

could extrapolate the 

skinny sticks of things 

birds use for land, 

the backward way they bend, 

the silly way they stand? 

And who, only studying 

birdtracks in the sand, 

could think those little forks 

had decamped on the wind? 

So many paired things seem odd. 

Who ever would have dreamed 

the broad winged raven of despair 

would quit the air and go 

bandylegged upon the ground, 

a common crow?

Kay Ryan

Kay Ryan is an American poet and the 16th poet laureate of the United States. She first began publishing poems in 1983, but only in the mid-1990s did her work receive serious recognition, after her poems began to appear in anthologies and national reviews published critical reviews of her work. Her reception of the prestigious Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize in 2004 marked her entrance into the short list of excellent poets writing in English. Her poems are noted for their terse, concise and deeply metaphysical observations—often tweaking logic and cliches with unexpected and witty results. She has been compared favorably in both style and substance to Emily Dickinson and Marianne Moore. She celebrated her 78th birthday on September 21.