three attempts

The young man works his hands
      around the frame;
He doesn't yet know what shape his work
Will take or where it will take him

---------

The young man works his hands
Into a knot, his right clinched decisively
In an inter-locking near penetration
With his lift to knead and re-knead
Raw materials, the tools of his labor,
Earthen clay, a sweat-drenched shop towel,
     today's responsibilities and
He wrings and wrings and trusts his strength
To hold him together; it's all a young man
Of his disposition knows: Trust not lest you
Be trusted and more responsibility befall you,
This anthem resounds; it's the inner voice he
Never consciously turns on
Or off.  He is unaware of it and
his hands learn to clinch tighter still, as
Though to hold the sweat from his palms
Forever enclosed in the lightless crevasse betwixt
His press to eventually turn on itself
To must and rancor, but that must needs be
The least of his concerns

---------

The young man knots his hands,
Left into right, wringing them
White and bloodless;
Worry eats him and is full.

He knows his diminishing self; he is
Well acquainted  - at a loss to contend,
But he does, at least in some sense,
Remain willing to classify his efforts
As such - as contest - and he sees clearly
Himself the jester of the crowded coliseum
Awaiting eminent annihilation
Through the teeth of a starved lion.

Yes, his worry is an anxious and
Hungry lion - before whose presence
He trembles with a fright that is, itself,
Formidable and an enigma beyond his
Ever tightened gripping,
Changing, forever the complexion
Of his poor and bare-laden hands