A poem.

I have finally decided on the direction I want to take this blog. The things I am presently interested in, and have been for sometime, are literature, society and spirituality. Therefore, that is the direction I am now going to take this blog. I will be posting a few times a week until I can get myself back up to speed on posting. To start things off, I would like to post a poem I wrote for your Sunday afternoon enjoyment. :)

A Steelworker Finds St. Louis Not So Pleasant

Thirteen, the day I began
To belt steel into steel to the tune
Of a Southern Man. My wages stoked
The fire of my mother’s stew
And the threads of the stitches on my
Sibling’s garments.

Nineteen, the day I began
To coat garish wooden boxes
With latex, and oil and stain.
With hues of green, purple, grey
And clothed my siblings the same.

Twenty-five, the day I began
To see the world through hops
Stained lenses, from the planks of floors
To the cool black of pavement, on streets.
My siblings repeated, every line of my
Coarse, brown breath, verbatim.

Forty-two, the day I began
To accept my mother’s words,
“Shades of your father, all of you,”
Echoed from the bottom of our shared
Cocktail glass. My siblings did the same.

Sixty-seven, the day I began
My career as a brown beard,
Much to the chagrin of my siblings,
Our mother needed the company.
Or so I told the smoking pepper-box.

-Daniel J. Adkins; 2008