The hammer lowered its horns
and the rusty nail shrieked
pulled from the place where it lived

The table-saw whined
like a virtuous bee
that knows it will die
in a meadow of dust

The sandpaper sighed
as it killed itself
caressing the sugar pine the ash

The housepainter’s brush
hermaphrodite
with a long stem a vaginal voice
and a spring in its bristle
swayed satisfied with itself on the wall

Glue the woodworker’s sperm
began to boil in the pot

The rags their breath
full of turpentine
demanded their rights
and threatened to burst like the sun

Then the woman
who turned into a mop
disheveled grey
worn out by the floor

and the man
who’d become a broom
his broad shoulder
lost in the dirt

noticed how even a motor
bleeds when it breaks
drops of oil stare from its skin
like the eyes of a frightened fish

1979


 = Daniel Myers