A novelist sits down to rewrite and, in doing so, changes the whole feel of an afternoon. That's the poem's opening claim: writing isn't just something done in time, it reshapes time itself. The hours stop being ordinary and become part of the work.
Then the mood shifts. The speaker says they "teem with debts and lives," which suggests a mind crowded with characters, borrowed ideas, and obligations to everyone and everything that has fed the writing. These are "so high and so many" that they feel like a pile about to topple. The final lines turn anxious, even a little dramatic. The speaker believes they must be ruined "if no god will come see," as if the work needs a witness, some higher approval, to count for anything.
The feeling is a mix of absorption and vulnerability. There is pride in the power to alter an afternoon, but also a lonely fear that no one may notice or answer. The short, spare lines make that fear feel quiet and exposed.