FRIDAY - The Working Mans pledge

I take my hands off the last of my chores
Arm myself with a newspaper and weekend attitude
Heading from this weekday prison
To escape amongst the weekend livers
My boots show the labour of my days
Dust covered, worn with tattered laces.
I walk faster
Trying to escape the world of work
In case it pulls me back inside and there would be no escape.
I have noticed it isnt just me that hurries
Others escaping have gathered their pace
Some even have allowed themselves to let a small etch of a smile gather on their face
I nod to colleagues as I venture further
'So this is what the outside world is like'
I have been living in it but not noticed it lately
Too wrapped up in doing my 9 to 5
To hear birds, see faces, smell the smells of seasons
I feel alive
I wont think of Monday, I will savour this,
Hold on to the thoughts of weekends
Like some small ray of hope
slipping through a workers hands
Marred with the dust of a daily work
Smelling weakly of warm toil
I rush to wash the scent from my body
and return to not being a workman
but being a man, the man I was before wage packets,
clocking in machines, brainstorming sessions and office liasons
I am a working man, but this I pledge
To leave it behind and live my weekend as though it was my last
And allow myself to smile again