LATHE LOVE SONG

Or workshop poem 8. 
This one I've been working on for a while and I'm reasonably happy with the draft. Before I go any further though, a word of explanation. 
A lathe is a machine to turn metal [or wood] and when I was an apprentice fitter/turner [40 years ago] I was taught how to use one. My trade originated from skilled artisans who could make and fit machinery to order. I was never that good...

I recently ran a workshop where the brief was to write a poem as a set of instructions and this is what I came up with.

LOVE SONG to a LATHE

You need the equipment,

the knowledge to use it,

or the foolhardiness to do it anyway.

I liked to watch the swarf

spiral off the spinning cylinder;

high speed; slow feed,

milky coolant lubricating the cutting edge.

You are looking for a metaphor,

I don't have one,

this centre lathe is our ages combined,

it's design even older.

Place the job in the chuck,

there is skill in centring the metal,

or practice, or a plodding predictability.

Always ensure you tighten each jaw separately

and never leave the chuck key in,

it has a tendency to fly at a tangent

and embed itself into the wall [or you].

Select the correct speed,

turn the chuck to ensure the gears have engaged.

In my day you wore a hairnet

to keep your fashionably shoulder length

[or in my case longer] hair

from being scalped off your head.

High speed, fast feed,

the waste metal complains as it it torn away,

in a series of razor edged nail clippings

[remember to clean the machine at the end of each day].

Measure by micrometer.

Each as beautiful a mechanism

as a good pocket watch.

If you so desire you could turn a cube,

simply counterbalance the plate,

disengage the drive, spin.

Add weights as required.

Grinding the cutting tools is an art form.

Get it right and you can cut a buttress thread

-male or female.

Slowly the tungsten bit will reveal the perfect helix.

But those days are over,

and this is a history lesson.

Here are The Decemberists at Manchester on Tuesday.

I have to confess The Rake's Song is not one of my favourite Decemberist's songs. This, though, I think is.

Until next time.