Poem

Work

No words only our breathing - two people

in a garage. Workbenched, love-bolted.

Quiet flits like wood dust. Rough surfaces

catch small sounds. My father and me,

constructing memories. He glues,

mixing resins with medical art. I carve

aluminium, butter-soft, young.

My vice holds a Chinese pictogram

with a promise of luck. I urge my fretsaw

carefully through the maze.

The tools are a language

he will teach me to speak:

screwdriver-hammer-longnosepliers

unused like spices, twinned

to the wall, shadowing themselves.

I coast on a lull, the air sawdust-spattered.

Soon, I will lose the Chinese pendant

and he will finish building the boat.

He will leave me with a brass fob-watch that

has stopped then

turn his attention to a project with no name.

Published in "Eureka Street", December 2007