Erosion

The sheets snag on my palms

like I’m made of Velcro and old wire.

Thirty hours of overtime

turned my skin into a geography of work.

I sit on the edge of the tub,

scraping a gray stone against the heel,

grinding down the armor

I built just to survive the week.

A fine, white dust

settles on the blue tile floor—

the discarded parts of me

that held a shovel or a crate.

I’m trying to find the soft man

buried under the callous,

one dry, gritty stroke at a time.