Progress

I equate it to listening
to your mother's last heartbeat -
the inexorable pound
that eventually will stop
while you sit helpless
next to her hospital bed

and watch the stereophonic
heart monitor fade.
There is a tightness
in the chest, a tightness
in the back, a tightness
around the eyes

and through the mind,
no peace while days
drift away and the slow,
inexorable pound
builds and builds
till nothing is done

and nothing accomplished
and another year
ends how it very much
began, in a black suit
catered affair, except
you're the one catering it.