Day One: "Time Enough at Last"

Time Enough at Last

—as if to say that it could ever be
enough, the hours and days
that heap up like brazen sins,
each moment an ode to desire,
a mind and body in such love
with each other that they would
crush the world between them,
break apart every atom.

And for what? A few years
of pages, a mound of books
pored over and worn down,
a glutton’s willing sacrifice
of flesh. You, Henry Bemis,
of the thick-frame glasses,
what fate did you expect
your empty world to leave to you?