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ALARUMS OFFSTAGE RIGHT

I’ve never liked alarm clocks,
don't know anyone who does.
To have my sleep so rudely terminated
leaves me feeling like the umpire’s calling strikes
before I’ve even stepped onto the field.

Time’s passage should be silent
as the movements of the sun and stars,
which, after all, our clocks but imitate.
Clocks are necessary, now that we
no longer live in constant sight of heaven,
but none but those with pendula
should be allowed to tick or chime
or buzz, re-fraying care’s worn sleeve
that sleep had nearly mended.
Technology may slice the hours
more and more precisely,
but no clock ever built
will be more accurate than astrolabe or sundial.
New devices, digital or analog,
I say, let them mutely name the hour
for anyone who needs such information,
but otherwise be instruments of peace.

What was that inventor thinking of?
Could he not imagine
what our mornings would be like,
when instead of being wakened
by the gentle reassurance of the dawn,
we are mercilessly shocked
into a semiwakeful, caffeine-craving torpor,
forced to rise, already cringing, hit the shower, hit the road,
and spend the day attempting conscious thought
in company of others just as sleep-deprived
and traumatized
and grumpy?

Clocks should not need bells or buzzers;
time is quite sufficiently alarming on its own.
Already seven-thirty? Oh my god, I’m running late!
Already Sunday night? Already August twenty-sixth?
And are you sure that calendar’s
not just a few years fast?

The AARP mailings came some seven years ago,
trumpeting the upside of maturity.
I really hadn’t thought about it much before that day.
Old enough to drive, to vote, to drink, to run for office--
what privilege was left to be impatient for?
One day last year, just on a whim,
I asked if I could have the senior discount at the movies.
I mean, what’s the worst thing that could happen?
Maybe she would ask to see my license
and say, “Sorry, you’re not old enough.”
But much to my surprise, she simply gave it to me.
And even more to my surprise, I took it.

I used to love surprises.
That was in the days when I thought
boring was as bad as life could get.
Now I find excitement can be highly overrated,
and I think I’d pay good money
for a little bit of boredom now and them.
But the good surprise of modern middle ages
is the freedom to be ignorant,
to shrug at last the burden of omniscience.
With your paid-up AARP membership
comes a card that lets you ask advice
from any younger person
about music, cars, pop culture, and especially technology,
from internet security to digital photography—
experts all around to tell you anything you need to know,
and most of them won’t even ask
for any of your knowledge in return!
As perks go, that a good one.
Now if they just would lobby
for a ban on all alarm clocks,
I’d be joining AARP right away…
well, I mean, if I were old enough.