Training

Wet black roots crack open orange and soft,
exposed to 6AM air and the cold blade of my shovel.
The first hole of the day, but Gags is sweating from his 10 mile bike ride commute
to the cold and coffee at Begley Landscaping, outskirts of Hartford, cloudy late spring.

All the old men, except Gags, would take their “sweet fucking time,”
pruning at standstill, dragging tools to another cigarette break.
Gags is John Henry, Dean Moriarty, a sweaty Bill Gates.
“This isn’t a job,” he tells me, dirt and root flying from the pit we’re creating,
“this is training.”

I heard he tried to teach his dog to race,
holding him by the leash
out the driver’s side window,
and he got him running
faster than 45 miles per hour.

He ran too, and spoke and drank
and worked with fury,
a blur of tools and sweat
and pint glasses,
impossible
to tell his age.

I worked here with my “college hands”
and guys who smoked Lucky Strikes with no filters.
I spent nights with friends,
explaining goals and plans,
and Mike Gagnon simply trained.

Back on some doctor’s lawn, April morning, amid soil and visible breaths,
Gags rests on his shovel, picks up the root, orange and flaking from its rotted center,
“It just gave up, Matt”
He throws the root and resumes at full clip, grinning.