We Tend to Sleep Better When the Clock Is Wound

than we do
when it’s all

wound down.
I don’t know

why we settle
to the sound.

Somehow
the regular

click and chime
of passing time,

like water, turns
a water wheel

that turns a gear
that turns a stone

that turns upon
another stone

and fine
and finer in between

our dreams like grain
are ground.

Source: Poetry (June 2006)