my prime was spent in sweat as I
hoisted joists and studs and sheets of ply
to second-floors and roofs,
lugged gypsum sheets from here to there
building bones and musculature of
arms and legs and heart through years,
through dust to dust —a carpenter
in high-top boots
besides the bucks I made in that
and managed not to keep
I earned another kind of wealth:
my body stored in blood and meat
the stuff that keeps me now in health
… best things
… don’t come
… cheap
Jim Culleny
4/25/18
Blink 