In a Jeep, With Dirty Hands

It was a long day,
out in the cold.
I'm working construction,
and the wind is working on killing me.

Couldn't wear gloves, today,
bulky fingers don't grab nails.
My hands are dry,
the skin is peeling and cracking around my knuckles.
I have more cuts than I can count,
my palms feel like they are on fire.
my forearms ache from using snips all day.
I like the raw feeling, though.
I like how the joints in my hands swell.
Secretly, I just like the pain.

My nose wouldn't stop running,
so my jacket is getting gross about the cuffs,
because there's no place for tissues on the job.
Part of me that used to care about stuff like that,
well,
part of me is horrified.
Mostly I just shrug and go back to work.

In Paul's Jeep, we are smoking pot on the way home.
I left my glasses on the end table, this morning,
locked myself out,
decided to make do.
The interstate is two blurry rivers of light,
gold and red.
There is rock music drowning out the wind,
and for the first time, since the girl left me,
I feel alright.

Mike is talking about getting chucked in the drunk-tank.
Three hots and a cot for punching a bartender.
It took us all weekend to scrape together bail
and now Marty can't get his radiator fixed.
I guess we don't mind so much.
He's on our crew and he does good work.

Paul is driving like a moron in traffic.
Marty and I shake our heads at each other and shrug.
I look at Paul and see myself if I still acted eighteen,
when I was thirty-five.
He has not shaved in a month.
He hasn't ever let that stop him from hanging his head out the window,
saying (Classically), "Excuse me, miss? Can I lick your ass?"
But he does good work and even if he's an idiot,
he's our idiot.

My crew is a bunch of stoners that never have gas money.
Living job to job, we are dirty,
wrinkled, unshaven, crude, callous and to a man,
we are frozen fucking cold.
Married and divorced,
hired and fired,
jail time,
down time,
overslept, and underpaid.
We are all these things and
we do good work.