Half-cut clocking on, his cap
       a pimple, his gut
       a sagging sack of slurry

​

       Feared neither man nor beast
       could lift a drill one-handed
       swing a skip of rubble
       like a kiddie’s pram

​

       Helluva boy:
       bear-hugged you unawares or
       sneaking up behind, grabbed
       with a giant paw your testicles

​

       Knew everyone’s rights
       stood up to foremen
       perched on a catwalk, cursed
       the Bosses, thumped his chest and roared

​

       ‘Me, Tarzan!’
       Why do I recall you now, Dai?
       Forty years on: far from
       the gantry’s rattle and the furnace roar
       the frantic bawls of unsuspecting victims: clocked off
       for good
       lying beneath the night somewhere, sober and still
       afraid of nothing and nobody.