Erector Set
Feb 15 2010


There are small round holes
in the hoardings.
At eye level, for a grown man
to stand
back to the world,
ogling Caterpillar tractors
dump trucks,
hydraulic shovels.
And a giant crane, like an iron-age monster,
with its prehensile neck
of rust-red steel
circling,
perched high overhead.

He smells diesel
rock dust, earth.
Sees tiny men
wheeling up ramps
beetling over girders.
Listens
as leering workers
wolf-whistle, curse.
He is a boy again,
lusting after Tonka toys
earth works
the gleeful roar of torque.
A steel skeleton
thrusting up,
like his dad’s Mechano
erector set.

The creative destruction
of progress.
The city, re-making itself,
promising to make us rich.
On this side
of half an inch of plywood
the city goes about its business,
oblivious
to the frantic cacophony
of hard labour
heavy machines.
And on the other
consuming itself
from the inside out.