The Cordwainer's Awl Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

I walked into a cloudy dusk,
entering the deep cave
of his workshop, where he sat
next to a small window,

a tunnel of sunlight landing
with egg shell beams
crawling from his shelves
to a taupe floor growing umber.

Wandering from pearl-white
wall to linen wall and from
alabaster wall to fossil wall.

Drowned in various shades
of light, he often got so light-drunk
that he lost the hue of time.

bathing in sooty shades he took
for night under mid-day sun.

(ii)

Clawing and pecking at shoes
of all shades, he was
as much of a shoe mender
as a preying, groaning cordwainer.

His workshop was filled
with columns of shelves, new
and worn-out small shoes

sitting on them in furry bodies
like baby animals
led by calves, kittens and kits
purring and mewling,

while beavers and rabbits
and calves of larger shoes watched on
from higher perches on upper shelves.

(iii)

His eyes pierced deep
holes through mine
before scanning me
with a stormy swipe

that continuously swept
across my face
as I chatted with him
outside his inner shop,

quickly losing grip on the point
at which my watch's
hand was pointing.

Only the bump and clash
of tools closely following
clattering and clacking
by his light-spun apprentices

spoke louder and louder
in various pitches
in the back space of his shop.

(iv)

As soon as I climbed
from a waiting outer terrace
and wriggled forward
for a rising perch
on his bumpy threshold,

the muttering cordwainer
transfixed me
with a lightning gaze
that left me bleeding -
eyeballs bloodshot -

with a growing
crater he'd dug into the wavy
haze of my rolling blinks.

As he settled
for a soft spot on my face,
drilling deep into
it an awl-driven peek,

making me scoop
out chrome and gold
from my dry pocket

for a flashily mended
pair of shoes

fetching only feathers
and cotton specks
of twisted old one-dollar bills.