Clocking off from Sankeys
This young man’s veins run with smelted iron.
Shift ends. Furnace bellows push him home.
He feels for his key in the oil worn bag
rummages for fags wedged between
Sketchpad and empty sandwich tin.
Lighting on the back step,
he calls it his Lucifer, joust and jab.
The blank page is his shield
from the die- cast pattern of his dad’s life.
He waits for the wind to drop, so he can capture
the shape of the leaves, protesting
against winter, stubborn on their branches.
The arc of his drawing
tempering stretching molten rage.
Anna Beddow is a poet who lives and works in the North West. She has had a long career in mental health and education.