Who would have thought that two vacant globes
preserved in alcohol
could so hold a construction
worker’s attention,
a devotional gaze otherwise reserved
for gravity-defying breasts or buttocks
if not always the eyes that go with them,
that cool disregard
that elicits a squint & a whistle
at whatever fails to fall into line.
OTHER POSTS IN THE SERIES
- Odes to Tools now in print
- Ode to a Socket Wrench
- Ode to a Claw Hammer
- Ode to a Musical Saw
- Ode to a Hand Truck
- Ode to a Shovel
- Ode to a Hatchet
- Ode to Scissors
- Ode to a Bucket
- Ode to Forks
- Ode to a Magnetic Screwdriver
- Ode to a Plumb Bob
- Ode to a House Jack
- Ode to a Measuring Tape
- Ode to Scythes
- Ode to a Plane
- Ode to a Spirit Level
- Ode to a Hoe
- Ode to Tin Snips
- Ode to a Crowbar
- Ode to a Coping Saw
- Ode to a Hive Tool
- Ode to a Compass
- Ode to a Shoehorn
- Ode to a Wire Brush
- Woodrat Podcast 2: Elizabeth Adams and “Odes to Tools”
- New Odes to Tools review by Noel Sloboda
- New review of Odes to Tools
- New review of Odes to Tools by Kathleen Kirk
- Odes to Tools as “living poetry”
- Scythes revisited
Bit of a dry spell (for me; certainly not for the weather here!). I’m afraid that’s the best I can do right now.
:-) I enjoyed it.
Hey, it made me chuckle. :-)
The spirit/body comparison is amusing, but a little forced…. It does add a dimension at right angles to both the level and the plumb bob. ;-)
Actually, I didn’t intend any spirit/body comparison – that’s been done to death with spirit levels, which are so called because of the ethanol (‘spirits’) in which the air bubbles float. I could retitle it “Ode to a Bubble Level,” I suppose, but I don’t care for the internal slant rhyme of that alternate name.
I’m afraid it snuck in while the construction worker was looking elsewhere. :-) ( Puns are inevitable; resistance is useless! :-)
)
Aee! I’m caught-out wallowing in the comment trough, once again. I enjoyed this.
Thanks. Actually, I liked the “git ‘er done” reference in the first draft of your comment.
Got ‘er did!
I really liked this. Amusing doesn’t have to mean it’s not true and there’s a ‘heap o’ truth’ in that ‘cool disregard’ line. At the risk of being slammed for punning..you nailed it. A whistle can be both a compliment and an insult (and apparently at the same time) ask any woman.
Thanks. But I’m thinking it’s probably an grossly unfair stereotype of contruction workers.
You are too hard on yourself. Nobody thinks all construction workers are sexist anymore than that all scythes have curvy handles. Whatever poetic or satiric way you approached it, for me you captured the fact that it’s not necessarily the whistle/hooting that enrages women but the disrespect and denigration in the dead eyes of many who do it.