Working Stiff Poem by Jan Oskar Hansen

a working stiff

Woke, the bedroom was cold under the duvet snugness
I burrowed deeper, enjoying the freedom of sleeping late.

Life was hard, getting up at five and preparing breakfasts for
grumpy seamen, smoking the first cigarette of the day.

The breaking of the fast was endlessly tedious, something
with eggs and fatty meat.

Sometimes when there was a gap between feeding times,
I tried to write; my hands stank of chip fat.

On hundreds of pages, "I'm alive, I'm a life".
I was a robot; my body is going through a motion.

When peeling potatoes, I was suddenly awake
fake brown gravy and spuds; there were no robots

The bed is warm; nothing can touch me now,
touch me now! ! ! !