My uncle leaned towards me, marble teeth

Piano keys, his face too tight, too round,

With trembling hands, I took the glass machino,

Into which I gazed with awe and wonder;

Whirling wheels and shiny cogs all turning,

Driven by a coiled bronze spring and sprocket.

 

Mesmerised for hours I watched that sprocket;

Its gleaming metal polished razor teeth;

Power from the spring that kept it turning,

As each adjacent cog whisked round and round.

For many hours on end I’d gaze and wonder

What fertile mind had dreamt up my machino.

 

In my mind I copied my machino;

The bronze cogs, shining spring and sprocket.

Inquisitiveness caused my mind to wonder,

How intimate was I with all those teeth?

Did I know each cog, how each went round?

A hideous idea started turning

 

Over in my head, minute wheels turning,

Mimicking the cogs in my machino.

The only way to know how each went round,

Dismantle every part, right from the sprocket

Down to each tiny cog with tiny teeth.

It all seemed so simple I did wonder

 

Was my contraption truly such a wonder?

Was there mystic force that kept it turning?

I took a rough tool and with gritted teeth

Started to dismantle my machino;

Hardened steel upon that flimsy sprocket

Sent teeth and tiny cogs all flying round.

 

As the hands of time turn round and round,

Often I sit back, reflect and wonder,

What impulse prompted me to touch that sprocket?

From that day my childhood world stopped turning;

I wished I’d not set eyes on my machino,

Or seen my uncle with his marble teeth.

 

Machino purrs. In its glass reflection

Proud jeweller’s grandson, milk teeth, shining round

Eyes watch in wonder that crucial sprocket.