After mass yesterday I found myself contemplating these words from the prayers of the faithful.
May all who labor or seek to labor find
mutual respect,
just conditions,
fair pay, and
a safe environment to work.
While I've been rather whiny about going so long with no power (it went on last night after 8 days), I had it easy in many respects. I had the luxury of hot showers and a working stovetop thanks to the power of natural gas. Others were not so lucky. While I waited for power to return, hard working men and women from Virginia and other states worked around the clock to get things fixed. I'm grateful to them. I know it was not an easy job.
For these folks, and all others who labor, let's write for them. Leave me a note about your poem and I'll post the results here later this week.
BROKEN BRIDGE
ReplyDeleteBy Steven Withrow
Between commutes, night workers have
Houdini’d a two-lane overpass,
Leaving steel-studded supports
Bookending the old post road:
Totems, tomes, magician’s lore,
A sleight of civil engineering
Conjured wholly out of place,
Span of vanished expectation,
As though traveling a novel
And slamming, mid-sentence, into
Ellipsis ... blank caesura
Of a chapter break ... cliffhang-
Ing, bridge-defying business,
No job for the faint (the feint?)
Of heart—this morning, are those
Hard-hatted daysleepers dreaming
Of dawn’s interpolation
In night’s rhythm of wreck and rest,
Or are they too done in by toil
To presto forth illusions
On the disappearing scrim of sleep?
©2011 Steven Withrow, all rights reserved
night workers have
ReplyDeleteHoudini’d
The construction workers near here perform sleights of hand that amaze me sometimes. You've done a good job capturing it!
Monday Thoughts
ReplyDeletehard at work
work of art
earthworks
worker bee
workday
handiwork
workers rights
worksheets
miracle worker
workforce
labor law
laborious
woman in labor
labor unions
secretary of labor
labor supply
love's labor lost
manual labor
labor movement
labor day
--Kate Coombs 2011, all rights reserved
Class Work
ReplyDeleteThis is labor of the lowest, bareknuckle kind:
the bending and stretching
of the farmer or fruit picker
as we tie the same shoes over and over, hang
glittering fish from the ceiling
the hefting and heaving
of the dock worker or trucker
as we haul in rolled-up rugs, drag
small but solid sinks and stoves into better spots
the sorting and stacking, shuffling and piling
of the secretary or stock clerk
as we stuff folders with important forms, fill
labeled shelves with puzzles and pebbles and paper
And all the while the labor of split-second decision:
just one, a few or all?
address or ignore?
now or later?
sharp voice or soft?—
All the while a bear-down, breathing kind of labor
pushing each child further into
the light of the world, eyes wide open,
fingers unfurling to grasp tools for
the labor of becoming
Heidi Mordhorst 2011
all rights reserves