Spinning to re-shape
on the lathe of misfortune
tools of memories
slice the old dead-wood away
shavings curling around feet
Round and round I go
ghostly hands remake my form
what I was, is gone
what I am, waits for pruning
severing grief from rough years
New clay on the wheel
trembling hands begin to mold
the shapeless mass pile
a new form slowly rises
shaped by daring, bold fingers
Painted ponies churn
straight road offers no answers
yet the circling does
we learn the truths we forgot
etched deep in the wheel's lament
Wood or clay spinning
hands caress, carve, and refine
as circle chants on
form and spirit are re-birthed
making a new beginning
Round and round I go—
shaped by the spinning
the rough falls away
a new form rises
in the clay, that's spun today,
-on the merry-go-round
-on the merry-go-round
show me a zero carbon footprint ~ and i'll point out its shoeless slave
but first we'll need a generator ~ to shed light on his pitch black cave
said an oil tycoon to the cobbler ~ who turns on the lathe for a shave
By
David Kavanagh
(center)Visions grow
out of our imaginations like vines.
We want to excavate a bare-knuckled past
with the jaw bones of concussed elks.
A cold moonlight carves them still.
They are the blunt teeth of a low wailing sky,
the works of a hand-crushed faith
far beyond the ken,
of we curious and depthless delvers.
We who stand now non-plussed,
our minds turned around
these mute megaliths
as if we were stone thoughts
upon a grinding lathe
searching
for any distant sense
of - why
while myopically questioning
the source of our
softly rooted selves.(center)
The war refuses the head, below wasting in dead
Rearing the front as storms fell the timbers rot
Upheavals breast, shorn and filled in neglect
Lay useless she had cried, allow dimple and deny
Tis only folly we are joined from, seasons blurry
Contemptuous fury, theatrical brevity, lifeless
Burning misery, hasn’t all gone and come
Just so fiddle and spun, as garnish and lathe
Without soured breads fortune, and curled ears late
Forever they attend, a hearts creative bend
And rule they must, alas at lose in unbreakable crust
He in hand created this land, in tales of ferried rows
Gentled slave we musn’t hate, crucible’s labors as knave
In there buildings, craving and fighting, loud and obscene
Fruitful as flies, multiplying night skies
Crying babes of violence, unruly and brutal
Off again we should shout as they, steam filled hovels in suet
Run, Run, .... The Lathe
From Field's Feat's Sum!
Sound Sound's The Victory
Strength.... We've, .... Brung!
The sky is a dull blur this morning.
At such opaque times,
I clean the lens of mind,
to see what clarity is behind
the gray filters.
Surprisingly, I perceive,
some last snowflakes
have been painted emerald,
by thin rays of light,
The air appears now,
as an ethereal lathe
turning the ill-defined into
buoyant landscapes.
Wiping my glasses,
the sky and earth
sparkle brighter still,
behind a clearer mind.
Many are the edgy tool forms shaping this piece
The lathe has turned for millennia with no cease
Milling takes place in immense illumination
Those sharp edges move; in darkness saturation
All instrumental in making this earth take shape
There IS, a part of this art; you're choosing to scrape
If you're here for a millisecond or more of a life-long roll
Like it or not, your existence a chisel; producing a scroll
You matter to us all, failing, succeeding, or long-time, no care from you
Life; chaotic at times, unfair, but something common to all; on this spinning screw
I am not working these words as a contribution of introspection
My need; to remind my fellow machinists, of how they make my life perfection
Hands of the piety
Phalanges of work and charity
Driven to spearhead not stoop
Enliven and share not droop
Fingers we dip on stoupe
Churches of the holy in troop
Our faith we lathe with pride
Strongly we hold not stride
Images we fond and draw
Murals we touch like straw
Gentleness in open hands we pave
Roughness in helping hands we stave
Our works and thoughts are one
Over thorns and bouts of man
Skins and colors of faith
Fins and winged colors of the laith
You are a work of art
Embellished with paints of heart
Filled with a well of hope
Influx of worth in the hull of rope
Ropes are extensions of hope that purport
Strengthened by faith and hands of support
Before you are no more
pass on something of meaning
to a stranger
some obscure legacy
you have owned for at least a year
for it has to have
the touch of you upon it.
Nothing engraved
nothing jagged with cutting edges;
a trinket, a small keepsake
a solid wind-honed something
that once was hand-made
on nature's lathe,
and because you have no idea
whether that stranger
will treasure it or discard it
as a worthless burden,
it will stand as a metaphor.
In its own small way
it will be indestructible because
it may fall
or be thrown from a pocket
until another stranger discovers it.
It will not gleam in the dark,
nor will it entice
anything but a curiosity
as to what it is and what meaning
it once held for someone.
That will be enough
for you were always a curious being
and now you have not only
endowed, but have transmitted
that part of yourself to another
and that is your currency,
an inheritance,
something to be discarded or
passed on.
A leaf turns
on the lathe of the wind.
Cities of iron crumble.
A scrapbook of soil
knits the land.
Earthworms patchwork
hidden birthing-chambers,
grit and gist abrades
into the leached sap
of leaf and grass.
Rain storms push up
an upholstery of luster,
mossy threads.
above tufted beds.
Frail daisy heads nod,
yet their roots grip and twist
as fibrous as hemp.
The turning lathe of a tireless wind
crumbles iron cities,
towers and arcades
stand emerald cast,
walls chained to creepers,
and a choking ivy.
Topsoil sinks to be
the undercroft of graveyards.
All is begun, all is lost
in the long gestations
of death and recovery.
Tempering's spun
beneath a settling moonlight.
The Working Man
Should have been born with a dorsal fin
That was made to stand proud
Only for time and oppression to cause it fail
Oh, tilikum, we weep
The working man is made to perform
His painted smile so fake
To please his masters, to earn his food
Oh, tyke shot 80 times, we weep
His fighting spirit tamed at the end of a payslip
kept lashed to desk or lathe
watching the time tick away
Tatiana roared just once more, we weep
Man was not made to dance for the man
To count his blessing for heat and to eat
To watch his time on earth deplete
Oh, Stephen, you are the working man. I weep.
A Job
I work designing guns
Never out of a job
Quite creative work
Firing pins to mags
Via handles and barrels
Art via a lathe
My mind and hands
Always at work
Like the hitmen
from LIZARD SNAIL 124K Nick Armbrister and other writers OUT LATE 2021/EARLY 22
It's through lot of pain and hardwork,
Using lathe machine to do metalwork,
Struggles in doing all the piece work,
The individual work and group work,
Before the product gets a trademark.
Day in day out we advance our skills,
As machines cuts, shapes and drills,
We work with passion to pay our bills,
The bad smell when the coolant spills,
Daily we operate a machine that kills.
As we wear the helmets on our heads,
We operate with dirty and oiled hands,
After plain turning we make metal bends,
Cut the metal into pieces 'n' make threads,
And take rest when the whole project ends.
Freely Asked And Wholly Answered
In Each Others Touch.
This As Much As More
And Never Less Than All.
Strange And Wondrous
Beauty Thou Art Rare
To Thus Descend
Upon Me Now As I,
Stand Thus Transfixed
Transformed Again,
Turned By Ancient Fingers
On The Lathe.
What Outcropping
Does Such Life Unravel?
Move Your Gavel To The Task At Hand.
Turn Your Wheel, Gravedigger Time,
That We May Turn Away;
Live To Scramble Eggs
Another Day.
Exquisite Pain
Unfolds As Petals Slowly
Opening Embrace,
Finding Sunshine
Kissed Upon Our Face,
Seeking Pleasures
In A Desperate Race.
Catch Me Though I Fall
And Breath Be Yet
To Hold Thine Hand;
Walk With God So Small
In Footsteps Shuddered
On This Land.
Oh Beauty Still,
A Tragic Glimpse Tis All.
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