“Hard Hat Dreamer”

He stands on the corner amidst the sea
Watching the people flow down the street
With their tenacity and their gnashing teeth
Sniffing out a piece of Joe Don’s defeat

Hard hat yellow
Belt like espresso
Protruding blades and metal

Helping him get that high rise built
Scraping the sky on girdered stilts
Because the land below his feet is too filled
With cracked cement and human filth

Five up, reach
For that white sandy beach
And the hero’s feasting

Upward he’s beckoned into fields of clouds
Floating, a satellite, never missing the ground
While the foreman calls for the lost, never found
He’s off into space where the stars abound

Ever the dreamer
Light redeemer
Escaping the meanness

Crash landing like a brick on the dusty concrete
His ears are ringing with a cacophony pounding
Gritty Jack Barrow hammering the pavement
Joe Don just stunned wondering wear his cave went

On he strains
Against earthly pains
As his candle slowly wanes

Life’s a Pleasantville in that dreamer’s mind
Away from all this noise he dances on cloud nine
Meanwhile the crowds tumble through their sweaty brine
And Joe Don Carpenter just bides his time.

Steve D