Time swiftly navigated the cold tile floor of the room they called mine and positioned himself at the side of the bed that was assigned to me.  He adjusted his oval reading glasses and from his hip revealed a pen.  With a click of the hammer, Time readied his instrument and prepared for notetaking on papers that I will never have the privilege to see.  Time lifted his right hand and asked me a question,

“Tell me what am I holding..?”

I stopped Time, “I told you already.”  And again I told him what I knew and why I was there, frustrated with the repetition of his inquiry.

“What.  Am.  I.  Holding,”  Time demanded more.  It was a fruitless battle and my response was exasperating.

“I.  Told.  You.  A hundred times a million times, over and over.  And over.  Again..”

“Then tell me again, because I am fickle and malleable,”  He bargained, “What do I have in my hand?”

I looked at his pen, “I don’t know.”

“Why?”

“Because I have no Irises in my eyes.”

“But I see that you do.  And I see them fixed on the object that I hold.  If you have no irises, how could you know where to look?”

“You must be mistaken.  I have no iris.  Not in this eye or that one.  I have no way, no view,”  I ensured him.

And unsure as I was, I watched without motion while he pulled the trigger and activated a missile of ink upon his target, a cluster of defenseless fibers.  It enraged me.  Time inflicted his tyranny;  he dug and scratched and imprinted his lies under my name.  It enraged me for his moment and the fact that he owned it;  It enraged me.  And with a silent rage that I still can’t explain,  I stopped Time from his words once more and exclaimed for all the minutes and all the seconds of this world,

“I.  See.  Nothing.”