Take this quiet woman, she has been <br />standing before a polishing wheel <br />for over three hours, and she lacks <br />twenty minutes before she can take <br />a lunch break. Is she a woman? <br />Consider the arms as they press <br />the long brass tube against the buffer, <br />they are striated along the triceps, <br />the three heads of which clearly show. <br />Consider the fine dusting of dark down <br />above the upper lip, and the beads <br />of sweat that run from under the red <br />kerchief across the brow and are wiped <br />away with a blackening wrist band <br />in one odd motion a child might make <br />to say No! No! You must come closer <br />to find out, you must hang your tie <br />and jacket in one of the lockers <br />in favor of a black smock, you must <br />be prepared to spend shift after shift <br />hauling off the metal trays of stock, <br />bowing first, knees bent for a purchase, <br />then lifting with a gasp, the first word <br />of tenderness between the two of you, <br />then you must bring new trays of dull <br />unpolished tubes. You must feed her, <br />as they say in the language of the place. <br />Make no mistake, the place has a language, <br />and if by some luck the power were cut, <br />the wheel slowed to a stop so that you <br />suddenly saw it was not a solid object <br />but so many separate bristles forming <br />in motion a perfect circle, she would turn <br />to you and say, "Why?" Not the old why <br />of why must I spend five nights a week? <br />Just, "Why?" Even if by some magic <br />you knew, you wouldn't dare speak <br />for fear of her laughter, which now <br />you have anyway as she places the five <br />tapering fingers of her filthy hand <br />on the arm of your white shirt to mark <br />you for your own, now and forever.<br /><br />Philip Levine<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/coming-close/
