POEM 4 Today

It's National Poetry Month and in honor of all who put pen to page in a creative way, even though I leave now for work for a few days I leave you with this:

Work Day

We arrive in the neighborhood

Early

Before Dawn sometimes

Shortly after local

Night-owls have gone

To sleep

Too soon to start work

Yet preparations

Need to be

Must be made

Silent as Monks we

Make precise, measured

Movements

Any disruption of which

Draws grumbles of

Disapproval

From grizzled old

Mechanics

Brick must be stacked

Just so

With-in the individual reach

Of each man

Mortar mixed just so

Not wet like slop

Nor dry like clay

But tempered to

The humidity

Of our present day

I am young

Even if the world

Is not so

We take care and are aware

of danger in every inattentive step

But when you look around

from on high

at the glittering jewel of a city

your heart pounds just a little harder

to know your stone and your mortar

are now part of this Manhattan

And I live for 8 O’clock

in the morning

When I can be

Out On West 71^st Street

To watch that beautiful

Woman walk her dog

her claves golden

in high heeled sunrise

her smile warm and inviting

my youth growing

between my thighs

I clutch my paper cup of coffee

And live for her

And the rest

Of the morning show