Rough Crossing

"Breed, Little Mothers,"1929 Breed, little mothers, With tired backs and tired hands, Breed for the owners of mills and the owners of mines, Breed a race of danger-haunted men, A race of toiling, sweating, miserable men, Breed, little mothers, Breed for the owners of mills and the owners of mines, Breed, breed, breed! Breed, little mothers, With the sunken eyes and the sagging cheeks, Breed for the bankers, the crafty and terrible masters of men, Breed a race of machines, A race of anemic, round-shouldered, subway-herded machines! Breed, little mothers, With a faith patient and stupid as cattle, Breed for the war lords, Offer your woman flesh for incredible torment, Wrack your frail bodies with the pangs of birth For the war lords who slaughter your sons! Breed, little mothers, Breed for the owners of mills and the owners of mines, Breed for the bankers, the crafty and terrible masters of men, Breed for the war lords, the devouring war lords, Breed, women, breed! Lucia Trent (1897-1977)

BLACK MONEY Tess Gallagher His lungs heaving all day in a sulphur mist, then dusk, the lunch pail torn from him before he reaches the house, his children a cloud of swallows about him. At the stove in the tumbled rooms, the wife, her back the wall he fights most, and she with no weapon but silence and to keep him from the bed. In their sleep the mill hums and turns at the edge of water. Blue smoke swells the night and they drift from the graves they have made for each other, float out from the open-mouthed sleep of their children, past banks and businesses, the used car lots, liquor store, the swings in the park. The mill burns on, now a burst of cinders, now whistles screaming down the bay, saws jagged in half light. Then like a whip the sun across the bed, windows high with mountains and the sleepers fallen to pillows as gulls fall, tilting against their shadows on the log booms. Again the trucks shudder the wood framed houses passing the mill. My father snorts, splashes in the bathroom, throws open our doors to cowboy music on the radio, hearts are cheating, somebody is alone, there's blood in Tulsa. Out the back yard the night-shift men rattle the gravel in the alley going home. My father fits goggles to his head. From his pocket he takes anything metal, the pearl-handled jack knife, a ring of keys, and for us, black money shoveled from the sulphur pyramids heaped in the distance like yellow gold. Coffee bottle tucked in his armpit he swaggers past the chicken coop, a pack of cards at his breast. In a fan of light beyond him the Kino Maru pulls out for Seattle, some black star climbing the deep globe of his eye.

Loggers Lullaby

  "'I was born," he said, "In the hills of Carolina, And the schooling I got In this great free land Of compulsory schools Was very simple; My MOTHER taught me Reading and writing And I went to school For a three-months' term, And a five-months' term! Then I was eight years old And my father went as a STRIKE-BREAKER to the West Virginia mines. I remember the TENTS Of the UNION miners, Driven from their homes CAMPING Over the river. They put me to work at once UNDERGROUND And when the inspectors came I had to HIDE In the old workings, For the legal age in the mines was FOURTEEN years. But neither the BOSS Nor my FATHER Cared about LAW! I was caught In the Papoose explosion At the age of eleven, And I ran away from home  At thirteen. I followed MINING All over the country Joining the UNION In Shadyside, Ohio. I was SIXTEEN then And had worked EIGHT years, And in all those years My only chance for schooling Was a short time After a FEVER, When I was TOO WEAK To WORK! But somehow I managed to get A good-looking wife Who encouraged me To improve myself! We had a little girl that died And a boy that lived, He's two years now And a BRIGHT KID; Can't keep still. We took a homestead Over in Idaho Till the government called For MINERS, So I came to Centralia At the country's call And after the Armstice There wasn't much work! I saw the raid on the hall And the starting Of the MAN-HUNT, And I rode home For my GUN To get some law and order In Centralia! When they arrested me I didn't tell all I knew, For I was afraid if I did I mightn't live to see A court-room trial!"

For more information on Ray Becker, the creator of the Rayfield Becker Papers, click here.

    I want you women up north to know     how those dainty children's dresses you buy         at Macy's, Wannamakers, Gimbels, Marshall Fields,     are dyed in blood, are stitched in wasting flesh,     down in San Antonio, "where sunshine spends the winter."     I want you women up north to see     the obsequious smile, the salesladies trill         "exquisite work, madame, exquisite pleats"     vanish into a bloated face, ordering more dresses,         gouging the wages down,     dissolve into maria, ambrosa, catalina,         stitching these dresses from dawn to night,         in blood, in wasting flesh.

To see the full article, click here.