{"id":349,"date":"2026-09-26T09:32:27","date_gmt":"2026-09-26T09:32:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/justcouncil.com\/?page_id=349"},"modified":"2026-10-04T23:01:05","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T23:01:05","slug":"song-of-the-time-of-the-sick","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/justcouncil.com\/en\/songs\/song-of-the-time-of-the-sick\/","title":{"rendered":"Song of the Time of the Sick"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-group jc-section is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"jc-kicker wp-block-paragraph\">Work \u00b7 Micha\u0142 P. Dybowski \u00b7 September 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote jc-scripture is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Hope deferred maketh the heart sick: but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.<\/p><cite>Proverbs 13:12<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-lead wp-block-paragraph\">A sister song to the <a href=\"https:\/\/justcouncil.com\/en\/parable-of-the-two-clocks\/\">Parable of the Two Clocks<\/a> \u2014 a song of help in need: about the time of the sick, about truth that brings relief, and about a community that lifts the burden of suffering from a person. Metre: octosyllable. Rhyme: abab. Four verses with a refrain; in the final refrain the closing line is exchanged.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-verse wp-block-paragraph\"><span class=\"jc-verse-label\">Verse I<\/span>Someone waits in the hospital night,<br>counting each of the long hours;<br>and time flows past him like a river \u2014<br>no one wades the ford with him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-verse jc-refrain wp-block-paragraph\"><span class=\"jc-verse-label\">Refrain<\/span>Do not take his time away \u2014<br>time today is his medicine;<br>do not leave him without a voice \u2014<br>a word of truth is brotherhood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-verse wp-block-paragraph\"><span class=\"jc-verse-label\">Verse II<\/span>You who seek his door by night,<br>though your shift has long since ended,<br>do not carry it alone \u2014 you cannot deceive<br>a heart that is clay as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-verse jc-refrain wp-block-paragraph\"><span class=\"jc-verse-label\">Refrain<\/span>Do not take his time away \u2014<br>time today is his medicine;<br>do not leave him without a voice \u2014<br>a word of truth is brotherhood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-verse wp-block-paragraph\"><span class=\"jc-verse-label\">Verse III<\/span>You who reckon the year in ledgers<br>and keep watch that the books will close,<br>remember: time is life \u2014<br>let the sick not know the cut.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-verse jc-refrain wp-block-paragraph\"><span class=\"jc-verse-label\">Refrain<\/span>Do not take his time away \u2014<br>time today is his medicine;<br>do not leave him without a voice \u2014<br>a word of truth is brotherhood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-verse wp-block-paragraph\"><span class=\"jc-verse-label\">Verse IV<\/span>Our fathers, poor after the wars,<br>raised a house penny by penny,<br>that in it strangers might be kin \u2014<br>let our gift build on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-verse jc-refrain wp-block-paragraph\"><span class=\"jc-verse-label\">Final refrain<\/span>Do not take his time away \u2014<br>time today is his medicine;<br>do not leave him without a voice \u2014<br><strong>from truth is brotherhood born.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity jc-sep\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Performance note<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-song-note wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Addressees.<\/strong> The verses follow the four addresses of the \u201cEpistle on the Time of the Sick\u201d: to those who wait, to those who heal, to those who decide, and to all who have ever supported the treatment of a stranger. The refrain is shared, because the matter belongs to none of these groups alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-song-note wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>The refrain as thesis.<\/strong> In oncology, time is not a service parameter but a clinical one \u2014 hence \u201ctime today is his medicine\u201d. The second half of the refrain carries the principle of Just Culture into the language of song: a person who does not know what they are waiting for suffers twice over, and truth spoken in good time is the first form of relief. In the final refrain the thesis turns into a promise: from truth is brotherhood born.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-song-note wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Images.<\/strong> The first verse presents time as a river which the sick person should not have to cross alone. The second speaks of a heroism that is a non-renewable resource: the doctor\u2019s heart \u201cis clay as well\u201d, so the burden is to be carried by the system, not by a single person. The third verse accepts that the public account must balance, but not by a cut aimed at the sick. The fourth recalls the Radium Institute, raised in the 1920s and 1930s from public donations \u2014 a generosity that built rather than patched.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"jc-song-note wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Performance.<\/strong> A chorale at a calm tempo. The verses for solo voice, the refrain for choir or communal singing. The octosyllabic metre allows the melody of a community song to be chosen; in several places the rhymes are approximate (in the Polish: czasu \u2014 g\u0142osu, min\u0105\u0142 \u2014 glin\u0105, stawiali \u2014 dalej), which in singing does not disturb the flow of the phrase.<\/p>\n\n\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Four verses on Proverbs 13:12 \u2014 a song of help in need, a sister to the Parable of the Two Clocks. On the time of the sick, on truth that brings relief, and on a community that lifts the burden of suffering.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":475,"parent":326,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-349","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Song of the Time of the Sick | Just Council<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The time of the sick in four verses on Proverbs 13:12: a song of help in need, of truth that brings relief and a community that eases the weight of pain.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/justcouncil.com\/en\/songs\/song-of-the-time-of-the-sick\/\" 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