Timepiece

by Susan Ternyey

The clock had stopped its interminable ticking,
The white-haired woman smiled.
At last no more its counting time
Would keep her waiting, impatient as a child.

Finally!  She could forget the dust
And the un-come visitors,
Her mind could follow its wanderlust
In pleasant Past Time tours.

Her anxious moments had been so many,
Her nervous hands unstill:
When would they come?  Oh, would they come?
How oft she'd paced 'tween here and window-sill.

And when they came, "Oh, here they come!
I thought I had just dusted!"
She'd flit and fly around her home,
Each treasured thing re-adjusted.

"Please come in, please do come in!"
"But grandma, we can't stay long--"
Before "Hello," or "How are you--"
The greeting of every tongue.

"Please don't mind the dust," she excused herself.
"Oh, grandma it looks just fine--please don't make a fuss."
But it wasn't fine, and she fretted so:
Her dusty house made her blush.

Half an hour was all they could stay,
Their lives were so full (hers so empty).
Half an hour, of one hundred sixty-eight,
When the door closed, she sat staring blankly.

She should get up and "Mind that dust!"
She told herself, the clock told her, too.
But where now was all that energy?
Nor hands, nor arms, nor did she move.

But now the clock had quit its ticking
And she went rambling on--
Noiseless, effortless, in her mind--
She saw her friends, her old, old friends,
She hadn't seen in so long a time.

The tiny woman with delicate hands,
And wrinkles, and perfect hair of snow,
Drifted off into peaceful sleep--
When her relatives came, she didn't know.

"Oh look, the clock has stopped!
We must wind it again for her."
"Tiptoe you boys; no giggles, girls;
We mustn't her dreams disturb."

And out they crept without saying, "Hello,"
Or helping her with her dust;
"How contented she looks,"--how contented they felt,
Not to have made her fuss.

The clock again with its relentless ticking
Began again to count the time.
The woman awoke, her undusted room
Intruded once more on her mind.