Proverb

I
You straight edges that turn the swells of sunlight flat;
Calipers that fold the pleats of landscape to a map;
Compasses that fix the endless world with sticks,
And metronomes that time our timeless songs with clicks,

II
Hourglasses that trap the tides
In a draining jar of sand,
And pendulums whose constant glides
Make the future secondhand,

Fill the gauges of our empty pond
With the astronomical embrace of time,
With notches on a magic wand
That mime the galaxies of rhyme,

The light years of a lover’s face
With measureless degrees of grace.