Cuckoo

Today, coincidentally on my Hebrew birthday, I received a package from my mother.

Inside the box, wrapped in wads of hometown newspapers, endless plastic bags and packing tape,

Lies a metaphor for our complicated relationship.

When I hear the vague flat chime, and puzzle out an intricately carved gable through the packaging,

I recognize it immediately for what it is: a clock I sent to her from Germany some 30-odd years ago.

Inlaid wood adorns the housing, attesting to something that was once of value.

The minute hand moves when pushed, but the hour hand hangs downcast,

The crippled timepiece literally overwound by desperate people she has welcomed into her home.

A fillet hangs through the void in the base, but there is no pendulum to propel it into motion.

Enclosed are two surprisingly weighty pendants, but they are detached and therefore useless. 

The long metal chains feel corroded by exposure over time to the moist breath of audible sighs.

Pulling the chain by the short end, I can momentarily force the fly-wheel into motion, then it stalls.

Weak links rattle loose, having dropped forged hooks that once held the winding weights.

Inside one can see the mechanism, the metallic gears, the tiny bellows on their wire stems,

Which, when pumped manually, produce the predictable and apropos ‘cuckoo’ song.

All this, submitted without note or commentary, representative of time, I suppose:

The passage of time, a system of reckoning or, in the end, simply time running out.