Phi pamphlets — Part 8: The day around the verb

The particles place an event in time; the time words say which time. Phi reads its day from the sky, eight stations of light with ordinary nouns for names:

Phi	Gloss	The station
`horathe`	dawn	first light
`kelua`	morning	the early daylight span
`thaeso`	midday	the sun at its height
`lorui`	afternoon	the span after midday
`howai`	evening	the day settling
`norawhi`	dusk	last light
`shero`	night	the dark span
`phoemu`	midnight	the still point

The ordinary prepositions set a clause among them, and the phrase stands in its home position, after the subject:

mia sui kelua theo.

1SG DUR morning read.

(I read during the morning.)

lopia tei norawhi wile.

child UNTIL dusk play.

(The child plays until dusk.)

01The phrase and the particle, together

A time phrase and a tense particle are partners, not rivals: the phrase supplies the station, the particle sets the direction, and each stays in its own position.

lopia sui philo to wile.

child DUR day PST play.

(The child played during the day.)

The pattern scales to any pairing this pamphlet has taught. A habit can wear its hour:

wheo sui horathe ro whunei.

elder DUR dawn HAB breathe.

(The elder breathes at dawn, as a practice.)

Every dawn finds the elder breathing in the garden. The station recurs, the particle says so, and one clause carries the whole standing arrangement.

02Yesterday, today, tomorrow

The near days are compounds of words you already own: ha philo, this day; luera philo, the past's day; wireo philo, the future's day. The primer's journal opens its entries with them, and they take the adverbial position like any time phrase:

mia wireo philo so theo.

1SG future day FUT read.

(Tomorrow I will read.)

Say it and hear the agreement: wireo and so lean the same direction, the noun giving the day and the particle placing the verb in it. The tense system is audible twice, and the two mentions confirm each other like a date written at the head of a page.

03How often

Frequency is a count of moments, said with the quantifiers you know:

mia sheloi shemu thalo.

1SG MANY moment walk.

(I walk often.)

lopia theula thimu wile.

child UNIV time play.

(The child always plays.)

Many moments, few moments, some moments; and at the ends of the range, all time and no time. The phrases stand in the adverbial slot, and the grammar of often turns out to be the grammar of counting, which part 6's ro complements from the aspect rank: the quantifier counts the occasions, the particle names the pattern they make.

Practiceplace the day

I listen in the night.
The flowers grow in spring.
Tomorrow the friend will arrive. Let the day and the direction agree.

Answers: 1 mia mua shero sheluo. 2 lo peloru mua wirae thuroa. 3 melu wireo philo so kamo. The future's day after the subject, the direction before the verb.