Time is a Tyrant - this truth well known
To all who have found and lost -
A Tyrant dividing each to their own
In a game of the hour glass' cost.

"Time is a Tyrant," said the Nurse to the Babe
On the day the Babe was born,
"So be sure to serve it well, behave,
Or forever be caught forlorn."

And the Babe that grew was as careful as mice
Not to stir the temper of mighty Time;
He ducked and he cowered, he froze into ice
And the frost on his heart turned to rime.

Then one day, as the Babe-grown-Man walked in the woods,
Hurrying so as never to tarry,
He was stopped in his tracks at the sight of an Angel
Whose treasure of love 'twas his burden to carry.

They walked arm in arm, this Angel and Man,
Till the sun in the leaves filtered emerald hue,
Then he down on one knee and sobbingly sang:
"I love, it is true, I love..."

But there in his head, as the Nurse had said,
Was Time, the Tyrant of ever,
And the Man, now standing, "I hate you," he said,
"I will love you... but never, but never."

The Angel fled, with tears on pale cheeks,
And white feathers strewing the air,
But the Man, left behind, was catching the streaks
Of her misery, soft as her hair.

Years passed in the wood, and the sunlight fled
The boughs where the lovers had been,
And now in their stead was Time's cruel tread
Spinning loaming of poisonous green.

Yet, many years after, the Man returned
And found his Angel there.
They sat in the shade of the sun, last it burned,
As he told her, at last, still, "I care.

"But Time is a Tyrant, for this you must know,
With a chain put around every heart;
The moment I loved you and thought love could grow
Time's chain grew tighter and forced us to part."

For Time is a Tyrant - this truth well known
To all who have played and lost,
Who have struggled and fought just to keep their own
In the game of the hour glass' cost.