The trees on the walk home
from my office job are stumps.
All day, outside the window,
I listen to construction workers
cut pines from the top down,
then mow over their trunks
with a yellow skid loader
that looks just like my dad’s.
Right now, he’s throwing bricks
at his factory job in a concrete
building, though he calls it the plant.
Not green, but sure as shit root
rotting, vining into every one
of his smashed fingers, his caving
lungs and chest. When I build
an image of my dad, he’s not
impressed. There’s nothing
conceptual about his fingers
turning blue or black. It’s life.
Fact. Look and see. In my living,
I complain. Grow weary trying
to capture in writing how I’ve forgotten
to walk with pressure on all four
corners of my feet. Every day,
at four in the morning, my dad
slides on his worn steel-toe boots,
walks out his front door, listens
to the hymn of his ignition, plays
his body like an instrument.