I was going to save it for Halloween, but I figured why not post it here. :)

Although I have never celebrated any holidays, this actually reminded me of New Year’s Eve. HAHAHAHA!

Or perhaps a spaceship launching, with some horrific mission ahead of it.

Anyway, good job. :P

Six Monsters, Four Chills, Three Doom(s) – is how it felt when I first read it.

In that vein, this feels like some apocalyptic augury, of a Vials/Bowls/Trumpets/Plague type.

I got the Halloween feel from it pretty good, although I can see the New Year angle as well. Very suspenseful. I liked the sudden end. Quite a fun little piece really =).

I love the Halloween vibe, my favorite holiday. Really fun.

Forgot to say!! Thanks for entering! And don’t forget to comment on all the others.

Also, on a second reading, I felt quite childish in my enjoyment of it. I’d be interested to know what kind of audience you were thinking of when you wrote it?

Ominous. This gave me a dark Christmasy feeling… with the bells and the clock… clocks always remind me of Christmas. Not the digitals, the grandfather clocks and the church steeple clocks, almost anything with hour and minute hands— which is what I envisioned. Also THE END at the end has a nifty double (entendre?) meaning— the end of the poem and the end of, well, life I guess.

Congratulations! You conjured Halloween, New Years (Eve), Dark Christmas with a few well placed words. Countdowns, as harbingers of things to come, are always filled with tension. Minimalist and exciting, it’s like Steven Niles (30 Days of Night) art. Well done! Oh and for me I was reminded of Hide and Go Seek.

I agree with the rest—it has a darkly playful sort of tone to it, although I think there are some spots where the rhyme seems a little forced, or the rhythm’s off. That’s the nature of any highly structured poem (which is why I’ve been avoiding them; they’re highly satisfying if you can pull it off all the way through, though). Mostly I think I’m looking at “from this hell” (rhythmically too short) and “doom they do portend” (an awkward restructuring just for the sake of rhyme).

I know I’m nitpicking, but only because I want others to return the favor on my work. Thanks for posting!

I can’t help but wonder why you started with 12 as opposed to 13, the unlucky number for Halloween. but Honestly the first thing to my mind was “Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate.”

Scary yet song-like… it could be a dark ritual!

Somebody should put this to music like a Halloweenish “12 days of Christmas.”

I’m irreverent to the core, so my mind is playing the opening theme to The Muppet Show after “until…”

I’m with Stovohobo, though. It’s a good effort, but needs a bit more work before it blows socks off.

Nice poem. Great job on the rhythm and the suspense.

Very Burtonesque, in my opinion.

Nice idea. Like some others, I’m not totally convinced it’s completely there, yet, but it’s definitely got potential.

I was kinda feeling the Burton vibe as well. It read almost playfully spooky to me.

I feel suddenly very paranoid…

Its a bit Lovecraftian. Love it!

Lovecraftian! My thoughts exactly, Job! I just got a new Arkham Horror board game called Elder Sign, where you try and stop a Great Old One from returning and I thought of it when reading this. Because every time the clock strikes midnight, bad stuff happens. A great read.

Reminds me of Nightmare Before Christmas in a weird sort of way but I like it. You built the suspense with very short and concise sentences, impressive.

Love how it’s been structured! Sounds like the perfect beginning to a horror novel and makes you wonder about what comes next.

This sort of reminded me of that one part from “Thriller” where the guy with the British accent was narrating.

• Moonwalks out of the room after THE END *

I like the playful nature of this. It’s spooky but not overdone. Thank you for sharing!

I was going to say new years too…Or a child’s vivid imagination with the bewitching hour …I know I use to fear 2am…because the grandfather clock sounded so much more scary at that chime for some reason…CREEPY

Yes, I agree with Stovo, “portend”, a great word, but a glare in this otherwise great poem Themes such as this, to invoke a feeling, such as fright, should carry a rising tempo, which this does, then a word many people don’t know appears, like turning the lights on in a haunted house, or a nightclub.