"A working man
that's what you are
a young, dependable
not entirely punctual
working man
and you can do anything
with your working hands
fix a tap, wire a circuit,
build a garden wall
or fell a tree
you can do
whatever you put your hands to
you can be whatever you want to be"

Something breaks

"with working hands
I'll try to fix it but
it takes time to learn
it takes time
to be good at something
for me
everything takes time
I'm not bad they say
just learning
in my frustration I wonder
what if I'm at full capacity
when there's more to come?
what if I'm just incapable?
destined to be an idle man
with rough, callused
soon to be soft
and useless
working hands"*

                    . . .

Well I want tomorrow today
so what good are these
working hands anyway?
I work and work and work away
pay my bills
I'm always late with rent
yes, work is overrated and
my pay doesn't make a dent
can't replace all the time I've spent
working with my hands

Isn't it funny
trading something so precious
for something as trivial as money
my brain works over time
day and night
when I get to work
it's like turning out a light
I think less and do more
it's kind of nice
so I think I'll sit tight
and stay on the tools
reject the office jobs

I can have it all
white finger
back problems
an RSI
bad knees
asbestosis
and arc eye
I can get all of them
so long as I try
work really hard and graft away
working man and all that!
who wants tomorrow today
when you can wear a hard hat?

Some sadness
Can't be burnt away
You'd get asbestosis
From the smoulder
You've got to wait
For brittleness
It's chips away
As you get older.

Metastasis. Blood. Asbestosis. Tumour. All the other words for we don’t know. All the other words for dead. New routine – get in the car & go to school & get out of school & get in the car & drive ‘til you feel like screaming & walk in through some chrome doors and go up through an elevator to hold some bones in your hands. Luck doesn’t feel like luck when it’s like this: the day before it happens I am listening to the breathing of a man on as much morphine as I feel I deserve right now those

Painful       breaths   feel        than     beating
shuttered   that         louder   a           heart

What was I saying? The day before it happens I am spending my last thirty minutes wishing that I were anywhere else. C’mon, take my hand. I’m invisible now – watch me evaporate through the wall of the building down back to the carpark down to the creek near the chrome building down into the creek. Watch me shovel mud into my mouth so I can feel it too. Metastasis. Blood. Asbestosis. Tumour.

Mud. All the words for we-don’t-know-if-it’s-days-or-weeks all the words for it-could-be-months all the words for liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar liar

Hold my hand in this 1-2 rhythm. Hold my hand. I promise I’m not bones yet. I promise I’m not like that. watch me evaporate through my own life. won’t you please hold my hand?

it takes two to dance but it only takes one to throw off the rhythm and i for one am sorry that i threw you so far & threw myself along with it & it doesn’t matter & it’s okay because you found your own way back & i’m still out here without the rhythm & I can still feel it lurking in my lungs & I think the mud is genetic

And lately late at night when I find myself thinking of these things / of how much pain you can have / of how little oxygen you can subsist on it really makes me wonder why you won’t take my hand

does the mud staining my fingernails scare you? it’s only the ends of me that are ***** i promise i wouldn’t do that i wouldn’t do that to you please we can excise the rot from the tips of me / from the total of me we can excise it. Won’t you please pass me the next mouthful of mud before I start again / start to end?

What was I saying? Take my hand. Breathe in with me. Do you know who I am. Do you know why you’re here. Don’t cry. Take my hand. Breathe in with me. i’m invisible now. watch me evaporate through you /  watch me watch you not try to stop me / watch me tie the belt against the doorknob because i learn from the best. Watch me float down to the creek / take your hand in mine & press the mud back into my throat.

watch me climb into your car & by your car I mean / not / your car because you don’t know how to drive or you do and you’re a bad teacher or you do and you’re a bad driver or you do and you’re bones in a hospital bed or you – (Watch me Lose who You are)
(Are you still breathing in there?)

watch me climb into the car & press my foot down on the pedal that I know & go like i’m magnetised to your house because i know the way from the millions of bus rides to the carpools to the you or not you or doubly not you taking me & watch me drift through your back garden through your trampoline with all the exposed metal & over your pool with the tripping / scraping / whatever hazards & careen into your back deck through your second dining table into the den & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally & finally

crash through your back glass windows into the couch that reminds me too much of the same one that someone has / had but not without the blood on it but it doesn’t matter really if i’m never gonna see you again & let me just blow a kiss at you with my mouth full of mud before I bite my own hand off –

AND

(0400 – No response. DNR)

won’t you please just take my hand while I spew all this bile at you?