The Sunday Poem: Lot 249: 3 x American wall clock cases – AF by Stephen Sexton

Three clock cases: whether cherry, maple

or imported English oak repurposed,

the auction house doesn’t say. They are stripped

of witness-marked mechanisms: wheel trains

of gears and pinions with hundreds of teeth

kept in check by gridiron pendulums

that would swing in equal proportions to

and fro, left and right. The lot will be sold

AF: as found. There are no guarantees.

Of the three, two have their crystals intact,

their faces domed as astronauts’ helmets

in the old nothing of the new frontier.

The third, whose glass has been smashed or stolen,

is nevertheless part of the bargain.

Stephen Sexton is the author of two books of poems: If All the World and Love Were Young (2019) and Cheryl’s Destinies (2021)

Illustration by Chris Riddell