Before it, kings must genuflect,
and heads of states shall pay respect.
Queens will curtsy, troops salute,
and legislators constitute.

For this is Time, Who Rules Them All,
commanding suns to jump and fall
then clocking moons around for weeks
and seizing hours when it speaks,

whole days in deadly decrements.
Time calibrates our instruments,
grips histories within ghostly hands,
and shackles wrists within its bands.

Invincibly, upon its throne,
Time reigns supreme, from stars to stone.
But stare there, longer, without fear,
and find what truth might soon appear:

the crown's as empty as that chair!
Now, where's our master, if not there?
Invention? Merely measurement
with no domain or government

controlling moments we will cede?
To understand is to be freed.