The Clock Shop Poem by Catherine Casey

Some time ago in Henry Street
Just up from Pentland Rocks
Beside the rustic station
There stood a shop of clocks.


Nearly outdoing Stonehenge in
Its quest of perfect time
It’s about that very that,
It's honoured now in rhyme.


Even gazed from such a distance
Viewed from rotary hills
Its waving flags of bunting
Were seen with all their frills.


An adage of Mrs Anvil
Before she passed away
Her son had taken charge with
Mean ophidian sway.


Tim Chrome - the young apprentice had
The job of morning winding.
A pleasure to his senses
Cogs a crunch and grinding.


Anvil paid the minimum then
He docked Tim even more
Gaining from Tim's dreaminess
To fail to sweep the floor.


To have a young eccentric was
For Anvil - daily curse.
His paranoia mind thought
Shoppers whispering worse.


Tim was always lost in his thoughts
Escaped - linear rules
Abridging concepts ancient
Dimension shifts his tools.


The clocks were Tim’s alluding to
A reference point in space.
The wormholes of profusion
When the cuckoo is in chase.


The facial glass were shields of flex
Gravity convection.
Transmitting GMT. That’s -
Gyro Mean Transflection.


The twenty twelve alignment - more
Than forty eight to nine.
It meant a way of seeing
It resonates a chime.


Tim wrote down his daily musings
Anvil saw as scratchings.
It printed in a journal
(Scientific Hatchings) .


It recognised as genius
Tim was penned a letter.
Professor Cantilever -
Wrote to Tim as vetter.


Anvil found the letter opened
(Steamed) with Goblin Teasmade.
Responding incognito
(Royalties pact tirade) .


Setting out in catchment - He found
Tim writing in mid-piece
For cruel contract of papers
His job he didn’t cease.


Tim’s optimistic nature was
Pleased at Anvil’s interest.
Making up in part, for what
Seemed Journal’s lack of ingest.


Continuation, falling sands
Of cyclical contentment.
Cantilever, Tim, Anvil
Fixed in their escapement.


The chronologic order was
So soon to be displaced. -
Lady seeking crystal quartz
So quantified in taste.


Tim’s heart beat with pounding as she
Swayed gently in the shop.
His latitude of gaze brought
Her movements striking stop.


When she halted, in her eyes was
Frequency dilation.
The numerals in sequence.
Rising contemplation.


One more work was all it needed
For Anvil a million.
Noble to retire with.
Fame then worth a billion.


He hurried back with fretted nerves.
Tried to light the kettle.
Searching round for Master Tim
Greed that wouldn't settle.


Young Tim had left a paper though
Not quite what he wanted
A letter - Thanks and Notice.
Proposal now granted.


He lit a cig then came a ‘Boom! ’
(Forgot to light the gas) .
He hadn’t paid insurance.
The clock shop was alas.


The morning of Summer Solstice,
(The twenty first of June) ,
They married in a chapel
Isles full of misty bloom.


Bride (editor for the Journal) .
Her boss saw Anvil's plan
The crone had cut ill-gained thread
Anvil was less the man.


Within and without the balance.
Whether things are constant.
Stays in the believers eye.
Makes all Anvil’s wantant.


A quantum thought to polish off
Brass and chrome momentum.
Swinging balls/lightning rods - Too
Synchronous to mention.


Complexities of lifetimes journ'
Across a rolling span.
Big bang really finishing.
It’s where it all began.