Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com


                            The Last American Westclox Baby Ben

                                                         (Maybe)


It ticked into my heart at the Goodwill store
Two dollars’ worth of Americana
A charmer in a battered metal shell
Hiding behind a tired plastic face

The tick, the tock, the talk of Peru, Illinois
The clock that woke America each dawn
For work and study, and to meet the Chicago train
For a century until time ran out

It clicks and clanks and ticks and tocks and talks

All-day dutiful hands, a jangling bell -
How long will this old clock last?

Only time will tell

In the little town of Peru, Illinois,
as twenty Eleven wound  down,
We heard the scream of  the fire engines
racing through our town.
The giant Westclox factory,
Abandoned three decades before,
had, at the stroke of midnight
burst into flames with a roar.
Peru’s biggest structure in peril-
neighboring houses in flames-.
We fought through the night
Through to dawn’s early light
wondering who was to blame?
The timing we thought was suspicious.
Was insurance the cause of the blaze?
Perhaps brazen Metal thieves,
looting the “Corpse”,
inadvertently started the flames.
Homeowners, who had greeted the New Year,
now wandered the streets in a fog.
On the sidewalks were scattered time’s ashes:
broken hands, melted Faces, loose cogs