Time

Sometimes, this is all it is:
grains of sand scraping down the hourglass
until the walls are sand themselves,
and the sand dunes last
until the wind blows in, and lost,
we are scattered to the north and south. 

They asked us once,
‘When is a pile a pile at all?’
and we could while away our lonely days
without finding much at all. 

Time will whisper by
and our ashes will be scattered:
grey sand under grey skies, and out
over the steel city sea
of cars and gleaming metal
that dulls in the gloom. 

Tell me, will it be the dove-grey of dawn
or the iron-clad dusk
when our ashes fly south for the winter?