While Ariadne held the clew
for Theseus to find his way,
a thread to escape the labyrinth
where the Minotaur was slayed,
Persephone awaited spring
to part from Hades and arise
from the underworld blossom
flora to earthlings jubilation,
Penelope kept her promise
declining suitors twenty years
for Odysseus to return, to her,
eternal wait in the maze
of leisurely time.
Oh time, so rapidly evolving
into a fleeting concept,
from a blessing to a curse, chased
out of fear of losing it, ridiculous
illusions of possession,
for how could anyone ever lose
something that never was
theirs in the first place?
While wait and slowness once were
an intrinsic part of life embraced,
rejected by industrial revolutions
technological progresses two
seconds too many for a message
to travel from Rome to outer space
ricocheted by a satellite
across the ocean to the surface
of a new world, is a wait long enough
to drive any human insane.
[Featured painting: Penelope and the Suitors by John William Waterhouse, 1912]