I saw it glitter
on the walk outside my door
a watch with no hands

the band was old
and cracked
the crystal scratched and dull

the universe consists
of bits of time
measured in a universal mind

the stellar stopwatch
ticks its way
from cosmic to mundane

how may we be measured
perhaps by the tossing curls
of a young girl's hair

cascading ringlets
singing in memory
perhaps by piercing loss

of what was close
yet all too distant
youth is dragging

chains of time
behind it
age will long for time

but fail to grasp
in a world where
no one escapes unscathed

time has kept us captured
perhaps the watch
with no hands

its handlessness endearing
will grant us time
to be human once again

I thought I heard her footstep on the stair,
the ghost of sorrow. Lingering on the staircase
of my dreams, she curled up like a ball

at the feet of longing. I had forgotten all
about her, after she kept another's company.
But there she was, bitter and alone

once again. What was sorrow now to me?
Only remembrance of how it once was-
the furtive glance, the stolen kiss,

the hidden measure of time passed
hand to hand. Time is what I have
for her no longer, though the memory of her

presses like a twisted nerve on an irregular heart.
Let her leave her fragrance on another's bed
where ghostly sorrow longs to rest her weeping head.