Metalsmith/

The Metalsmith


		for A: husband, artist, polio survivor


In the tick, click, tick on tile
the brace nicks and crutches thump.
Iron strips stiffen the upper lip of bone.
Hammer life down cold,
quench the buckling heat
of shame and pain
to steel.

To steal—to step up, 
to get up, move on, forge
two minds to one. Fuse seams
then crack the mold. Fashion bodies
in a bold line raw.

Together we polished through urban grit
and desert blows. Dented,
scoured, yet still I know 
that tick, the mechanical click,
the pitch that sounds you—
you are my gold.

Published in Slab,Issue 4, 2009