The Taos Carpenter
Like almost any carpenter, he calls on God
when he hits his hand with a hammer.
A man so long working with trees,
he likes his shade, the light breeze, but more,
the stillness. Leaning his back against the cottonwood,
he calls his girlfriend, saying, Punkin, saying,
Baby-love. He lets his dog out of the truck,
pouring him another bowl of water.
He puts his dog back in the truck.
He misses the days of hand-planing
an entire cabin’s-worth of floor boards,
though he never owned a plane.
He lets his dog out of the truck.
The board feet in a nearby ponderosa pine
are intuition to him, and groove means many things.
He can be humble.
On his break, he writes a two-line poem
for his book of two-line poems:
God has nails in his
hand.
And there goes a man
with the hammer.
from Dolls (Orchises 2009)
("and here are a couple photos of my truck"--JP)
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