Work Injury
Posted: November 24th, 2005, 9:47 am
Last week I was injured at work and just spent 4 days in hospital with a broken vertabrae and other injuries...this is something that has come out of it..
The Wall & I
There it lay
Harmless really
A great spruce dinosaur
2 x 6 & 1/2" ply
It's going to be a wall
But not yet
One day it will have a window
To peer out at blue skies
The valley's woods outback
Hidden amongst the birch, beech & bush
A river
Not some great meandering Nile
Or the powerful Niagara
Just a simple river
A creek
The Don
It once turned a mill stone
Resting in a park now
Just up the hill
Little boys raced hand made boats
Imagined rapids
Now it's a dump
Urban refuse
Rusted bicycle
Now we grown men
8,9, or 10 of us
To raise that wall
Spit to our hands
Cold breeze in my eyes
Bent knees
Not young
But creaking
The strain of all the walls
I've bent over
Paying homage to
My father's walls
My walls
Now other's
Hands cold, cracked
Leather palms
Grasping
It's fresh edges
Lifting
This symphony of men
First to knees
Peering straight ahead
Sun shines
Off it's face
Then to our chests
Barrelled
Loving
Hardened hearts
Finally over our heads
Arms stretched taught
Like the spruce it's made from
2 men
Scrambled
Bracing it at partial height
Then levering it
Higher
The sun welcomes it's dormer peak
Unlike all the thousands
Of
Walls lifted in symphony
Something is amiss
It roars
Twists it's defiance
The bottom slides off
The floor's edge
Again it roars
Twists
Out from it's careful square
Breathes it's fowl
Ancient breath
On me
It pounces
With the force
Given by all walls
Before it
Slams
On me
The others escape
Then slithers
It's ugly coil
Back down to the forest
Leaving me
Small
Destitute
Writhing desperately
The men broke symphony
Lost
gaping
Wide eyed
Why
How
They too
Broken
Wanting this gone
This mangled body
Wanting simple breath
To survive
And I do
But not really
Each of those
Skilled men
Of hammer and nail
Die with me
The Wall & I
There it lay
Harmless really
A great spruce dinosaur
2 x 6 & 1/2" ply
It's going to be a wall
But not yet
One day it will have a window
To peer out at blue skies
The valley's woods outback
Hidden amongst the birch, beech & bush
A river
Not some great meandering Nile
Or the powerful Niagara
Just a simple river
A creek
The Don
It once turned a mill stone
Resting in a park now
Just up the hill
Little boys raced hand made boats
Imagined rapids
Now it's a dump
Urban refuse
Rusted bicycle
Now we grown men
8,9, or 10 of us
To raise that wall
Spit to our hands
Cold breeze in my eyes
Bent knees
Not young
But creaking
The strain of all the walls
I've bent over
Paying homage to
My father's walls
My walls
Now other's
Hands cold, cracked
Leather palms
Grasping
It's fresh edges
Lifting
This symphony of men
First to knees
Peering straight ahead
Sun shines
Off it's face
Then to our chests
Barrelled
Loving
Hardened hearts
Finally over our heads
Arms stretched taught
Like the spruce it's made from
2 men
Scrambled
Bracing it at partial height
Then levering it
Higher
The sun welcomes it's dormer peak
Unlike all the thousands
Of
Walls lifted in symphony
Something is amiss
It roars
Twists it's defiance
The bottom slides off
The floor's edge
Again it roars
Twists
Out from it's careful square
Breathes it's fowl
Ancient breath
On me
It pounces
With the force
Given by all walls
Before it
Slams
On me
The others escape
Then slithers
It's ugly coil
Back down to the forest
Leaving me
Small
Destitute
Writhing desperately
The men broke symphony
Lost
gaping
Wide eyed
Why
How
They too
Broken
Wanting this gone
This mangled body
Wanting simple breath
To survive
And I do
But not really
Each of those
Skilled men
Of hammer and nail
Die with me