Poem. A Job Well Done

A Job Well Done

The snarling trucks
enter the muddy lot
a few minutes apart.

Radios playing.
Trucks with rifle racks, pipe racks,

racks of blinding lights.

Watching the tradesmen build
the new house behind the park,
I marveled at how fast they moved
when the sun had not yet risen.
Lifting heavy timbers, large panels,
and swing cold iron in the morning mist.

They wore ball caps, helmets.
and heavy vests.
Poked wads of chew between
teeth and lip.
One fellow held a Dixie cup to his mouth as if to drink,
spitting a stream of brown slurry into the cup.
He donned his overalls and made jokes with the other men
about his hard night
and hard girlfriend.

All the carpenters girded and strapped like warriors.
A claw hammer, nail gun, razor knife, wide belts,
hooks, buckles, pencils, and loops -
a pocket for cell phone. a pouch for nails.
I saw bright yellow tapes, blue chalk,
armored knees, and steel-toed boots.

Men scrambled up metal ladders
bowing from their weight
skipped across the edge of planks, high in the air.
Motors buzzed, air hissed, blades whirled,

I still had sleep in my eyes.
I could smell fresh fir, pine and cedar,
compressor oil and tar paper.

An artist snapped a blue chalk line.
A puff of blue dust went into the air.
Another used the spirit level and
telling bubble
to plumb a post.
Thwack, thwack, thwack.
Men shot staples into the roof.

They now owned a better view
of a ball of fire
rising over the leafless trees,
casting a hard, white, light onto the
buildings and trucks.

A few boasted a view
of forming rainbow
or the young couple across the way,
sitting at their kitchen table,
the first breakfast
in their new home.

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11-29
Rev. 6-20100