October 9: Retirement

Steady tick, tick, monotonous tock, an empty sound

this morning, and then tick, tick, tock again.

A battery-run desk clock should not tock,

the inexorable shock of time unraveling.

Outside about a block away, a thrum of cars hums,

stop and go at the corner.

I balk at the mad rush and sip my coffee.

Ah. Clock sounds fade,

the ‘paper’ on the screen invisible.

I write pock-marked scratches,

chalk lines soon erased, unfinished,

take stock of what is left to do, and hear again

the clock inventory my days.

Octpowrimo's prompt (a poem a day for October) has us exploring sound, poetry as music, and maybe playing with onomatopoeia, no doubt to make our readers flutter, bang and whir through the rest of today, October, the beginning of fall, a time when red and yellow leaves swirl to the ground, and we hold to each day, reminded that winter comes. Check out the link to see what others have written.

Fall leaves,West Virginia http://www.forestwander.com/