Buying Time

Have you ever noticed that in advertisements for watches the hands are almost always set at ten past ten?  Check out a few ads and you will see.  Anyway, this just proves that inspiration for a poem can come from anywhere.

Note:  Timex says the hands on the timepieces are placed at the ten-ten position so the company logo on the face will be framed and not blocked by the hands.  The industry standard used to be eight-twenty, but that looked too much like a frown and created an unhappy look, so they changed it.

BUYING TIME

from the Falling Bodies series

Pointing northwest and northeast,

all new timepiece hands

are set at ten past ten.

(Its an internationally supplicating posture

based on market research,

subliminal message,

and the appealing gesture

of the raised hands.)

In a life filled 

with such trivial manipulation,

some days I am tempted

to identify, classify and name

all of my demons.

Some day you save me.

You push against me 

as gently as a breeze.

As surely as a blood thrum

that accompanies a potent brew,

you coax from me

incantations,

bright sounds springing

from the same root

as birdsong.

Through mystical language

I am bound to be set free.

When I was a victim of self-forgery,

you compelled me to see

I could never have been born

under the hands of another.

When I lost my feathers,

you offered music 

and opened my ears.

If I could have brought forth,

one by one,

all the fish in the sea,

I would not have found

the magic salmon

on my own.

In small tribute, I lift my hands,

I touch your mouth,

for to dive into such honey

is to be born into sweetness,

pure sunlight, 

again and again.