The Time Is Out of Joint
 

Out of Sync

It's almost one. Which means it's almost two.
To read the manual fills our hearts with dread,
so setting dashboard clocks is hard to do.
It's almost one, which means it's almost two.
Though half of every year our time's askew,
frankly, we'd rather do the math instead:
it's almost one, which means it's almost two.
To read the manual fills our hearts with dread.


Revisions:
L1 was "It's almost one, which means it's almost two."
L3 was "so setting dashboard clocks we just can't do."
L6 colon was a period
L7 "it's" was "It's"

Finally! A brave voice challenging the scourge of modern American society! Daylight Savings time. I live in Alaska, where the position of the sun has almost nothing to do with the clock time. Twice a year I have to perform this meaningless ritual. Thanks for speaking out! Very nice triolet.

Even though I'm a person who so adores DST that I wish it were* always in place, I like the poem. My first thought was that you could go for something deeper, about how advancing time doesn't change reality, or how we might just keep advancing time to escape our lives, but that is getting into fantasy.

I'm surprised that DST is used in Alaska. I mean, you go from being in the dark almost all the time, to being in the light almost all the time, so what does it matter?

Still, for me, living on the East Coast, DST is the syrup on my sundae. It makes everything better. (I hope you still like me, Glenn.)

* "Were" is right, right? I almost used "was". When I was young, that particular grammatical rule was ingrained in me, but it seems to have faded.

I like this fine except L3, which with its inversion slips too far out of natural speech to feel credible. But I enjoyed the metrical variation in L6--it seems to come at just the right spot and makes a great case for the claim that creating a conversational feel is an adequate justification for such variation.

Thanks, everyone, for the responses.

Glenn, I don't hate DST, but the changing back and forth is inconvenient, and can be dangerous, I hear, when sleep is disrupted.

Perry, yes, "were" is correct in that context, a "past contrary to fact" situation. This poem is just light, mildly satirical verse, so I don't want to take it anywhere serious.

Alexandra, people do occasionally invert syntax for emphasis and other reasons. I have tried removing the inversion, which reads more smoothly but feels less emphatic to me. I'll see what people think of it.

Susan

Susan, I find your new L3 a vast improvement. Personally, I was so distracted by the artificial feel of the previous version's syntax that any intended sense of emphasis in it was lost on me. But I suppose that if you were keen on having emphasis in the new line, you could say something like "setting dashboard clocks is hell to do."

Hi Susan,

This raised a little smile for me in the way that a bit of observational comedy might. It takes a familiar annoyance that seems almost too trivial for poetry and shines a light on it. It seems more a grouse about modern technology, how it can complicate rather than simplify our lives, than a grouse about DST itself. After all, I'm sure you move the hands on your old-fashioned clocks in your house easily enough.

Fun.

Alexandra, thanks for letting me know that you think the fix works.

Mark, yes, it is partly a satire of the difficulty of modern technology and partly a satire of people who will put up with any inconvenience rather than bother to leaf through a manual. Observational humor was the goal. I can change the clocks on most of my electronic devices without too much difficulty, but the technology of my mother's car is not self-evident without surfing the manual.

Susan

As I read the poem, I like it more and more. It is short, pithy, precise. However, why are you limiting your dread to the manual for your CAR (as indicated by the word "dashboard")? Why not bemoan having to reset ALL your clocks. Here is a suggestion that would accomplish that:

It's almost one, which means it's almost two.
Reading manuals fills our hearts with dread,
so setting all our clocks is hard to do.
It's almost one, which means it's almost two.
Though half of every year our time's askew,
frankly, we'd rather do the math instead.
It's almost one, which means it's almost two.
Reading manuals fills our hearts with dread.

"Manuals" is an awkward word. The thesaurus might come up with something better. Of course, you'll need a word with stresses on the same vowels, which will be hard to do. That would leave out "directions".

Perry, this poem is not meant to be about the difficulty of resetting all of the clocks, but only those clocks that one could never figure out how to set without consulting a manual. Many clocks are well labeled and straightforward in terms of how to set them. "Manual" does have an extra unstressed syllable, so I would call this poem loose iambic. But I am not sure that "user's guide" or any other synonym would work equally well.

Susan

All I was trying to do was to show you a way that the poem could be given a broader meaning, so as to have more appeal. Right on my desk I have a clock which is dark because the electricity went out, and I couldn't figure out how to reset it without consulting the manual. Eventually, I just unplugged it.

This is fun, Susan, and so true!

In the UK of course, we call the two time zones BST and GMT, and most of us deplore the difference.

'Two cars ago', to coin a phrase, I drove for six months with the clock out of sync because I just couldn't figure out how to alter it. Looking at the manual was definitely a no-no for me!
We have a clock on the gable end wall of our conservatory. It's a large one, high up, but can only be reached by using a step-ladder. You probably guessed it - we can't be bothered to alter it, so it's showing the wrong time for half of every year!

I'm a big fan of triolets, and no less so with this one.

Jayne

Hi, Susan! Enjoyed. You might consider changing this

     It's almost one, which means it's almost two.
     To read the manual fills our hearts with dread,
     so setting dashboard clocks is hard to do.
     It's almost one, which means it's almost two.

to this:

     It's almost one. Which means it's almost two.
     (To read the manual fills our hearts with dread.)
     Since setting dashboard clocks is hard to do,
     it's almost one, which means it's almost two.

Perry, it is true that other clocks can also be confusing to set. But the more that cars become computerized, the more complicated it can be to set their clocks. I wanted to keep the focus on that, but I don't mind getting other suggestions.

Jayne, I am glad you liked it.

Julie, I took your suggestion for L1, and I have made small alterations to the punctuation elsewhere. I don't believe that in a triolet one always has to alter the repetends, but it can be fun to work in a few variations.

Susan