Washing and Drying*
I saw a pyre of food-stained dishes
and cutlery,
soap-greased silverware, wine glasses
blotched in lipstick marks and leftover
claret.
I put on my damp apron and got to work
over the sink. Nice work, if you could get it after
dark,
rinsing the detritus of early-bird orders away
and under fluorescent overhead glare, plates
piled up by the minute, the sauces and froth
sloshing to
and fro, the last of the beer suds gurgling
down the drain. The fella I worked for
had kept
this place in business since
the early nineties; I had to admire him
for that
and the generous tips me, him and the waitresses
divvied up in the downstairs bar when our shift
had finally ended. The stereo above the roster sheet
belted “Live and Dangerous”,
Phil’s wrathful
voice, thirty years dead by now, snarling
the chorus
of ‘Emerald’ long before he collapsed to heart failure
all through the steamed kitchen. It was the first regular
job
I had, scraping food-stains off porcelain under the
scalding
rush of the tap for eight hours ’til quitting time, when
I cycled home in the dark through narrow streets,
against the murderous amber of streetlights
and rain-clatter.
They say work will swallow you clean, body
and
soul, until only the fatigue is real, and the years
drift
at an iron-heeled pace. Know what I mean, like?
I’m washed and dried, coffee-fuelled, hauling
rubbish bags down to the dustbin in the alley,
moving slower,
the corridor
weeping with muddied suds and the oven waxing
hot as the underworld, hot as the sweat
dribbling
off my temple. This is just my life, one in many,
prone
as the candle I light on the table-top ahead
of the dinnertime rush, sublunary,
flinching in alarm under the sweep of a pitiless
spotlight,
and with eight hours still to go ’til my shift ends.
*A version of this poem was previously published in 2-Meter Review, edited and anthologised by Beau Williams and Hazel Hogan.
In my early 20s, I worked the night shift as a kitchen porter and commie chef at a restaurant and bistro in Glasthule.
My shift started usually just after lectures at college had finished, and I'd cycle down and spend the 8-9 hours keeping the kitchen good and ready for that evening's round of customers. I got my fair share of beer vouchers out of it, too, at the time, which, when you’re 19/20 years of age, is all that matters, really. I was also reading the poetry of Philip Levine with great enthusiasm, and his influence definitely affected this one.
The place was so small that on a busy night, there would be a maximum of 80-90 customers. It was only me and the head chef manning the kitchen, and, strangely, we got on alright (it was a very far cry from The Bear or Boiling Point). He’d usually have Thin Lizzy and Howlin’ Wolf blasting away on the stereo while we worked, and we’d work for a solid eight hours into the evening, just me and him.
Since then, I’ve had many jobs that proved to be far worse, so it made sense to honour this one with a verse.
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