EPITAPH

I.

An eye is naught but a window inside.

A vestige of all earthly wants

And time’s mausoleum of hopes; desires,

Does nothing for Christ’s gaudy flaunts.

Not crucified, but worn away by ticks

Forgotten, changed and perverted

Over years of infinite maddening clicks

Left hope a child; crucified, deserted.

A weight in each pocket for the ride

While time lies smashed in the window

A thousand hours all trying to be right

But the shadows creep and only they know.

And meet them coming up; falling down

A year wasted and rectified in an instant

When what you want is dooming you to ground,

And Christ-not-crucified can but repent.

II.

Tick.

Another little piece of my life cut off.

Tock.

Another light behind my eyes shut off.

Tick.

Why is every second taken without a word?

Tock.

Chlorophormed and kidnapped; screams not heard.

Clocks slay time, father said.

A river underfoot; then overhead.

Smash the face of time and laugh.

Drown alone in clicks and ticks and telegraphs.

Tick; Tock.

And Christ is dead.

Tick; Tock.

Silver platter for a head.

Tick; Tock.

A fist around a broken clock.

Tick; Tock.

Not shadows nor words can drown “tick, tock.”

III.

Blank slate for those who can find it.

Make your own, for Christ was ground to sand.

Unstoppable march of time;

Someone came and took what’s mine.

If Christ was left alone to die,

Would we immortalize a crucified criminal?

Hands hold tight to time;

Hands grab away tick; tock sublime.

A jeweler’s Cyclops of machine,

Can fix time’s cage that lies broken.

New hands to choke second;

To wear away the holiest blessings.

And touch on a nerve; you can’t go home

Left the failure with nowhere to go.

A solution to all; all but time;

The smallest clicks naught but decline.

IV.

Blood flows thicker than water

But time turns t all to dust

Even though the clock slays time,

Even its gears will falter and rust.

Tick, tock, tick, tock screams,

Hopes and desires embalmed.

Slay the slayer of the killing-time

But in our hands are prison walls.

Tick, this little hand stealing.

Tock, this little hand strangling.

Tick, this Christ just falls away.

Tock, these merciless seconds mangling.

How can gears and hands hold time?

Father said clocks slay it, I believe.

But you can’t imprison what you’ve already killed,

So all you can do is kneel and grieve.

V.

Shadows unto shadows, the only way to know.

Tell our time at Nature’s whim, no geared-devil.

But if Christ didn’t hang for our hideous sins,

So are we our own saviors, or in Hell will we revel?

Broken glass can face the faceless,

The fingered hands of time’s prison,

But without time are we graceless,

Left but a savage division?

No.

Too much left uncertain, behind a year long gone.

Ruin the lives of many so one gets his chance.

But too much at stake, and failure’s inevitable.

Like Father said, Christ just wore away, no song, no dance.

Twisted hands lose grip on time,

Letting it free into another’s grasp,

No time for yours, naught of mine,

No one seize, no one speak nor rasp.

Cold.

Tick, tock; let it fall away.

Tick, tock; as lost men pray.

Tick, tock; only seconds more.

Tick, tock; never even life’s score.

Tick.

Tock.