Dave Bonta's short poem circles a familiar worry: how do we handle time, and can we change what's already happening? The opening is odd and a little funny. The speaker turns a simple stick figure into "a new enemy," as if drawing something could create a rival. Then comes a doubt. Can a "seer," someone who sees ahead, be trusted with "the management of lead"? Lead is heavy, slow, and hard to move, so it feels like time itself, or perhaps the weight of the past and of worry.
The third stanza admits a real eagerness: the speaker was "so ready / to alter the present." That readiness sounds hopeful, maybe a bit overconfident. The ending shifts the tone. Instead of fighting the clock, the speaker and the clock "danced / all night." The mood moves from suspicion and tension to something playful, even tender. Time isn't beaten or controlled here. The speaker gives in to it and finds a kind of partnership, though the poem leaves it open whether that is peace or surrender.