Factory Lift

PHOTOGRAPHER'S JOURNAL:

Factory Lift

I'm not sure I ever noticed how 

much elevators are a lot like clocks.

Pulleys and weights, that's all they are, 

and the right grease to make them glide. 

One is set to lift a load. 

The other leverages our hours. 

Ours,

if we can buy them back 

at the end of the haul. 

Four hours in two shifts plus food stamps. 

Of course, we can always use the stairs. 

I'd like to be the guy that drives the elevator, 

propped on his stool, floor numbers in his head, 

with his wrist twisted around the handle that levitates us. 

He knows to within 30 trips 

plus or minus 

how many trips he makes each week, 

and figuring market cycles roughly, 

he can tell you how many trips he will have to make 

'til his last ride in twenty-three years, 

so many months, weeks, days hence. 

He's steady, and he never uses the stairs.