Poems And Time

People often assert poems and time are enemies. Professor Louise Cowan thinks it's open warfare. She declares, 'Throughout all poetic utterances, whether or not openly acknowledged, runs the threat of the poetic enemy, TIME. For time inevitably leads toward mutability, and behind change and loss lurks the spectral image of extinction.' WOW! I think we need a prose poem on this issue: A poem exists in an infinitely extended present tense. It's true. A poem never has to search for lost time. It calmly exists while past and future tenses madly swirl around it. A poem has been known to smile, even laugh when past and future exhaust themselves with activity, and lie sprawled and breathless on the floor of endeavor. A poem knows where it belongs and it can wait in that space for centuries, yes, centuries, without showing a trace of discontent. Every poem is timeless!