“Half Past Two” uses the idea of time to present childhood as a time of innocence based in ignorance. U. A. Fanthorpe connects the idea of knowing how to tell time to broader knowledge of the rules and reasons that govern appropriate behavior, especially at school. Time appears as connected with fairy tales and memory in the first line. The child’s idea of time is associated with personal markers. The clock for him is not an instrument; rather, he sees its face as an animal-like object.

…he knew
Gettinguptime, timeyouwereofftime,
Timetogohomenowtime, TVtime,
Timeformykisstime (that was Grantime).

In “Piano,” D. H. Lawrence also presents time as associated with the past, as the speaker conveys their childhood memories. Similar to the personal associations that Fanthorpe uses, Lawrence’s speaker relates the experience of sitting under the piano and joins the abstract concept of music to home, the family, and especially the mother. The piano itself is an object that evokes the memories; the large size and the color, especially from the child’s perspective underneath it, of the “great black piano” parallel its major significance. The adult is saddened to think back on those times:

the heart of me weeps to belong
To the old Sunday evenings at home.