"Tick, tick, tick,"
The little watch shouts.
He sits inside my pocket
And awaits me drawing him out.

Tic, tic, tic
It's time for me to rest.
Society and anxiety
Give me too much stress.

"Tick, tick, tick,"
His voice puts me to sleep.
I love his perfect rhythms-
The perfect time he keeps.

Tic, tic, tic
The second I put him away,
The vicious tics come back
I wish they wouldn't stay.

"Tick, tick, tick,"
Directly into my ear.
The only way to stay 'normal'
Is through the rhythm I hear.

Tic, tic, tic
Whenever I am stressed,
The painful tics come back
And cannot be suppressed.

"Tick, tick, tick,"
The second-hand marches on.
Enduring all his hardships,
He's rewound every dawn.

Tic, tic, tic
My fists are bruised and aching.
"What a crazy spaz"
Society's gaze is saying.

"Tick, tick, tick,"
My lovely watch proclaims.
I whisper the rhythm back;
The perfection keeps me sane.

- - -

I need my pocket watch beside me.
Though it may not seem I do.
You simply do not understand
The troubles I'm pushing through.

The terrible sounds and motions
Are so very, very draining.
The worry to always suppress,
Wears out by the day's ending.

My watch sits beside me,
Ticking as I write this
(Ticking so I don't have to),
And reading as a witness.

As time passes by, the past has been sealed. We cannot travel backwards, time will not permit us to do so. Instead, we need to look forward in life. We are the ones who control our future. It is up to us to fulfill our dreams. If we don’t seize what lies ahead of us in time, our life will tick away...just like the clock that ticks away time.

maybe you are my new nervous tick, because let's be honest, I'm a little obsessive. and if it's not you, it's the person after you. the person I can't recognize because I am so blind to everything but what we had. it's my involuntary physical and mental attraction to you that makes me tic, makes a tic, that is my tic. it's repetitive; calling you Friday night after Friday night, believing it may fill me up without drowning me out. but I'm empty, I'm always empty. I don't mean to involve you, and I know you think I do this because you're still my everything, but you're just a something. a physical preoccupation I've yet to overcome, as you're always in reach. cover up the void you've left behind, never fill it - that isn't your place; tics are not mutually beneficial. we in no way help each other. do not know a way to help each other. you aren't my saving grace; you're the bad habit. the phantom limb I need to forget. the tic to fit my criteria: close, but never here. available to hold me, but in holding me you're making my tears. could you ever fathom such a senseless incongruity? and just where are you now? you're holding me in the darkness but I know you don't feel what I feel, won't ever feel a thing. me ignoring the truth of your coldness, the brevity of your affection - tics like your timepiece. maybe next Friday night, it'll be different. maybe next Friday night, I won't need a tic like a crutch, won't be crushed. until then.