Morning bells

Ada Lovelace Day

It could be a thousand years ago. Maybe not. When the bell?

When the Roman Empire fell, the church used a bell
for a hell of devious scheme:
To summon their flock, they invented the clock
they made time with their new machine...

The mass bell at SS Simon & Jude cleanses the air of noise, driving city groan all the way to the horizon, each peal a stroke of the wet sponge down the slate blackboard, blackening it, its momentary purity pierced & puckered only by the come-and-get-it perorations of cardinal, bossy finch, lovesick chickadee — "O sweetie!"

After two dozen iterations, the door in the sky closes, erasing itself.... Crows crowd west, yelling, cars cram the sensorium with their belligerent being.

Left behind, I busy myself with shoveling empty time from here to there, until the next bell.