Grandfather’s Clock
Grandpa surprised us
with a black and white picture
taken at Grandma’s death bed
where her share of time
suddenly stopped at 8:30am.
Grandma died before her time
we didn’t see the color of her eyes
and grandpa could not recall it, either;
he only repeated
her kind and wise words to us.
Grandpa, thin as a stick
had a hesitant smile
smelled of cheap cigarettes
the pomegranate shade in his eyes
and his graceful frown
made him appealing in a strange way
Once in a while
he would mumble 8:30
under his only few teeth
and sometimes after
the departure of a doleful silence
he would bend and whine
like a wounded dog.
Grandpa, not as cold as we thought,
never rewound the clock
and did not go to sleep before 8:30
or far from the dead clock
during his share of time.