Job at the Junkyard

I remember the heft of car doors  
wrenched off American cars, like claws  
off a king crab, to be further mined  
for door handles and window crank knobs  

I remember the grease, that a quarter  
could buy two sticks of Philip Morris,  
I see the solace of cigarettes  
and hardly any of the misery,  
 
We see only the edges of memories,  
pictures take a stab at reminding,  
asking you to squint, to peer at a face  
hoping you divine the face behind  
 
it is not time that deducts a fact, a face,  
it is the work that we wallowed in,  
work is the thumb that smudges the names,  
turns all into blurred and black and white.