Time Management

Luther in the year he spent
as Junker Joerg in Wartburg towers,
translated the New Testament
to pass the everlasting hours.

Though living as a refugee
Erasmus wrote his tour de force.
In Praise of Folly’s said to be
the product of a trip by horse.

With dinners late, D’Aguesseau saw
an opportunity to write
his sixteen-volume work of law
in fifteen minutes every night.

Today I slept late, took a walk,
sipped coffee on my ragged lawn,
checked the mailbox, saw the clock,
and noticed half my life was gone.

by Stephen Scaer
From the June/July 2009 issue of First Things