This month’s Versed in Florida poet is Naples born and raised Eddie Krez-MIN-skee. He’s a senior at Florida Gulf Coast University and plans to get an M.F.A. in creative writing. His work has previously appeared in Foliate Oak and The Mangrove Review. In his spare time he reads, writes, and plays bass in two bands. His poems have his father in common, as he tells WGCU’s Amy Tardif.
The Carpenter
He says one day I can have it all:
the house with the paid mortgage,
the lawn with the carefully trimmed hedges,
the business and the trucks and the lungs
full of wood dust.
Under his wing, he shows me the finer points
of woodwork; coaching me on the inherent
crookedness of walls, teaching me to trust
my eyes more than the tape measure.
These days he knows I've been waking up hungry,
yearning for the kind of life where I can rise
with the sun and put in my penance — a day's worth
of hard work that will scar these silk-soft hands.
The same hands of my father that I saw as a child
pointing to something I needed to notice,
that familiar bend in his index
where the table saw wouldn't give,
even an inch, leading my eyes.