COUNTDOWN

Ten seconds are but a brief measure of time

to end the year with crystal balls and fireworks,

for merry-making crowds awash in winter’s cold,

their fortune-teller omens drowned out by noisemakers,

as the year’s boundary reaches a hair’s breadth away.

The rise in fever pitch slows down the descent,

flashes meteoric memories behind the eyes,

blinds any view beyond star-struck gazes,

as dinosaurs must have stared

before the K-T boundary was laid. 

The countdown gets closer to one,

the doomsday clock looms above the bacchanal,

unseen, it beats out a metric drum roll,

unheard by multitudes who believe in and

count down to

tomorrow.

© cmheuer, 2017