ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

HACK WORK


My first proper job
for a couple of bob;
I swept the factory floor.
I shovelled the waste
from machining, displaced
for the skip outside the door.
You had to keep working
and not be found shirking
or try to disappear,
the tea break was through
when the shop whistle blew
or the foreman kicked your rear.

You boiled there in summer,
you froze there in winter,
when you dodged around the cranes
Occ. Safety and Health
was; just watch yourself
by using your flamin' brains.
There was oil everywhere.
you got dirt in your hair,
and steel stuck in your skin.
In that trade rank and file
I was least in the pile,
where else could I begin ?

Who could have thought
how time would have brought
the final proper job.
Dressed up spick and span
befitting the man
to superintend the mob.
That mob didn't know
what I couldn't show,
the memories I bore
of a long, long way
from a distant day
for the hack of the factory floor.

Goodonya Nev, I have similar recollections from my first foray into the workforce.

I posted some comments on this piece in the thread, "Consistent Metre" ...

I liked that Neville. Was the Super's job at the same place?
Wazza

Thanks Manfred. No Warren, the labourer's job was in the machine shop, the bosses job was years later in the cop shop.