Counting Down

Counting Down

Harold Meyerbeer is a

meek man with a

desire to do something a

man has not ever done

He does not yet know what it

is, but he knows that if he

sits in this bar long

enough it will come to him

The clock is ticking oh it’s ticking

Sharon Gufaltefel holds off the

world by earning degrees.

The less she knows, the more she

needs proof that she knows more

She walks her den, lined with

diplomas, and strokes the

letters that follow her name like the

heads of beloved pets

The clock is ticking oh it’s

Karen Gotterdammerung vows that,

once the last of her seven

children strikes out for college,

she will do what she really wants to do

When the youngest hits

high school, she retreats to

the bathroom and feels an

emptiness ghosting her spine.

She takes her birth control pills and

tosses them into the toilet

The clock is ticking oh

Bill Keiderweltz spends forty

years preparing other people’s

taxes, composing mental movies of

their lives from the hints contained in

their receipts

Today he applies an apostrophe of

umber to the leftmost margin of an

oceanscape and stands back

Astounded that his hands could

have done such a thing

Puts on Gershwin and cries

 

 

 

From Michael J. Vaughn: Collected Poems

Notes: The wish to create something is oft-stated but rarely fulfilled. I have been gifted with the ability to take that first step, to not care about looking foolish, and I wish I could share it with others, but it's something that has to begin inside.