Don Winter
Working Late
Slumped in a rusted folding chair,
he locks the chuck into place,
keeps count of finished pieces
on a junked chalkboard.
His burden is keeping awake,
even though the roof kicks with rain,
and the wind turns
on itself in the empty truck docks.
He remembers: last month a guy on six
fell asleep for a moment
and his hand became
a red stain on the greasy cement.
He keeps the heat off, drinks black coffee
but each piece he bends
to lift is heavier than the last.
He lugs each one to the soup of oil,
a dull light marking a field
where rain is filling in the well
of his throat.
Page(s) 24
magazine list
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- 10th Muse
- 14
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- Agenda
- Ambit
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- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
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- Dream Catcher
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- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
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- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The