We clock in, clock out,
soles scraping stone.
Building sandcastles
under egg-white lights,
dragging dreams by the bootstraps.

The cuckoo calls—
not song, but warning.

We eat scraps of leaf and meat,
not dainty cucumber salads,
out of torn paper bags,
taste the dust and grime.

At the gates, a bagpiper
plays—his notes raw.
Half battle cry, half funeral.
Dead tired, we still rise.