For Whom the Clock Tolls - Jan. 30, 2022

Katheryn’s grandfather clock

her once proud companion

now sounds to me like a broken

ballad for her shrinking world

striking every hour on the hour

a church’s procession song

in long vibrating tones of death

played for the speed

of a head down shuffle

and unclear thoughts

from her worn dusty chair I wonder why she still rises

to wind it every day

mortality’s constant reminder

sixty more minutes of loneliness

regret and memories but mostly

this endless bone-aching isolation

sharing lunch the other day in her

dim dining room I thought I heard

Could silence be any worse that this?