HIS  WORK 
My lover’s work leaves me distraught: 
he cheats me with his crafty tools. 
Their cunning matches the maiden wood 
while my heart sinks and my belly yearns. 
I know a saw when I see one! -- 
its teeth bite one behind another. 
The wimble pricks, the auger bores, 
the screw thirls in under the screw-driver. 
The hammer drives down: blow by blow 
the nail goes in, making its own hole. 
With tine and hole and a curled shaving, 
(O father, son and holy ghost,) 
my lover had a lizard that lost its tail: 
but luckily the tail grew on again.

                     (1945)