Index
1) Men Marching
2) The Old
Laborer
3)
Men of the Steel Mill (Men crowed
together)
4)
Men of the Brotherhood (words of the preacher)
5)
The Iron Machine Man (can men love men)
6)
Men of the Slaughterhouse (Middle-aged)
7)
The Humble Man (Slaughterhouse dilemma)
8)
The Great Figure of Industry (Power of the Minds)
9)
The Factory District (and the little girl)
10)
Two Roads (“My foundry grew and grew—“)
11)
A Stringer of Words (A definite purpose/the old
painter)
12)
The Road of a Soldier (without
regret)
Note by the author
on the poems:
these
poems are about hard men, men of iron and steel, and hard boned: and underneath
that hard bone and flesh, is: blood, sweat and God. Men who work in Steel
Mills, and Iron Foundries, and Slaughterhouses, factories, truck drivers (over
the road), and soldiers: the author in his youth worked in all areas but truck
deriving, but he is of such stock; he worked in: two iron foundries, one steel
mill, and two slaughterhouses, to include four factories—in the Midwest and
upper Great Lakes area in the United States, in particular: Seattle, Erie, and
San Francisco, during the 1960s and ’70; and was an active soldier for eight
years, a decorated Vietnam Veteran. They are hard drinkers, they use hard and
rough language, some are prideful and angry, some are loners, fighters, and
many are prayerful men, when alone. They have big hands, broad shoulders, hard
muscles, harsh voices, dirty fingernails, thick fingers, tears they hide, most
have old scars, missing fingers, and most are straightforward: but when it
comes to God most bend their knees without hesitation, or remain silent
standing: they are real men moving, in a tired world (wrong or right, they
tread the ground of God’s holy earth).
D.L. Siluk, 11-2013
1) Men Marching
How
does God see us?
As
a moving mass—! Who’s to say?
I
try to grasp the minds of leaders (as
most of us do)…
My
simple mind, grasps about—
Striving
to follow the greater, only to find out in most cases,
Men
make their own gods—
Each
goal is the birth of a new god…for them!
And
life goes on!... and so does
—the
hunger in the minds of men (men of
iron)
—as
if they are marching, endlessly marching—
What
are they looking for, I ask myself?
“What
the world has not come up to yet!” Is my Answer!
Yet
my question begs a better answer:
“The
soul wants a sense of order! Should we all walk
Shoulder to shoulder it would make the seas
shutter,
And God Almighty move onto other things.”
#4115 (11-19-2013)
2) The Old Laborer
Who
is this man, crude in his ways —
Huge,
muscled, a laborer (perhaps
pastime truck driver)…
He
is but one who has lived in the world since time began!...
And
still he stumbles blindly about
Rubbing
his eyes, awakening only to find he has labored
away his century…
As
the dust of the fields, and the factors move on—
He
missed the haggling of Jesus’ followers over the price of the wine
for the Last Supper!
The
old laborer now moves slowly, legs tingling, wanting to fall;
His
throat is hot and dry—on and on forever he goes…
He
doesn’t talk much, he does listen although.
He’s
waiting for the impending hour!...
There
is gentle murmur—scarcely audible—
He’s
thanking God, for his bread.
#4116 (11-19-2013)
3) Men of the Steel
Mill (Men crowed together)
She
stood facing him; it was like facing her own soul!
She
wanted to go back to pulling weeds in the field, or instructing the
children…
Not
to make another trial at life.
She
felt like a little animal in a forest inhabited by larger animals—
So
there she stood perfectly still for a longtime
His
idea—common among men—that the woman be protected
physically and from the facts of life—
Hence,
she lost her vigor for life long ago…
Watching
him come and go, to and from the steel mill!
She
hated and lived him.
She
asked God “Why do I care for him—what is in my nature that has
made me care for him?”
The
marriage serves his body, she pondered, tenderness naught!
He’s
a colorless creature, she told herself.
Then
it dawned on her, as if God Himself, threw alighting bolt into her
brain:
“He’s
a coward, afraid of me! I cannot cure myself by running away… Yes, I too am a
coward,” and she prayed:
“God
take the fear of his hard glean that comes into his eyes from my
soul, I shall then be cured!”
There
she stood by the door as if she was a deep shadow—waiting,
just waiting for his return with
trembling eagerness.
#4117
(11-20-2013)
4) Men of the Brotherhood
(A Calmer of Hearts)
Men
with broad hands, men of building trades
Big
and small men, laboring men, of the brotherhood!...
All
with intense faces
The
words of the preacher were shot forth—
Sharp
like a blast from a pistol
His
sentences short, broken, disconnected—
But
the picture he tried to draw, flashed through their minds
(they
would have rather fought with a wild animal hand in hand, than sit
with their
wives in the church listening, seeking the right expressions).
Sweat
poured from their brows, they moved restlessly…
They
knew they couldn’t wrestle with God and win,
So
they just grappled silently, as if with an opponent.
#4119
(11-20-2013)
5) The Iron Machine
Man ((Can Men love men)(the Factory))
The
man got rich from his Iron Machine—
The
man operating the Iron machine got his arm and leg torn off…
Now
he lies in his bed (underpaid):
“Am
I to love the rich man?” he contemplates.
“Twenty
years I have worked the rich man’s iron machine, made the iron
machine man rich:
“My
kind have given his kind automobiles, houses, children made for
madness (as
they let them run about misbehaving)
“We
have cried and cared for them, and still the rich man shakes his
finger and commands, as he speaks of
pity of us—
“Can
we love that?”
He
moves his huge form, he sits upright, his wife now is his arms and
Legs: his eyes.
He
is no longer a giant! He prays for a
miracle.
#4118 (11-20-2013)
6) Men at the
Slaughterhouse (Middle-aged)
The
middle-aged men sat sideways on the benches, resting:
A
troubled look in many of their eyes—
Not
expressing any thoughts to one another
Lucidly
interested in one another’s viewpoints…
They
knew if they got sentimental it would spoil their work
or peace of mind.
To
get sentimental about women, any woman is a fool,
and of course he is (was their way of thinking).
After
work it would be the ball game, bridge, reading the newspaper, or
beer up at the bar…
The
break was over, back to the slaughterhouse on cracked stone
steps—
Now
windows: swearing and shouting, hurrying, cutting, pulling the
great hogs from conveyor to conveyor—
Breathing
deeply, thinking about Sunday’s mass and confession!
#4120 (11-20-2013)
7) The Humble
Men
(The Slaughterhouse dilemma)
He
knelt by his bed, told God he was losing his humbleness for his
estranged wife
((he
was the foreman at the slaughterhouse) (iron like broad shoulders, thick
fingers, in his fifties, four fingers to each hand))
Humbleness
swept over him and he blamed himself for his petty
thoughts, twisting around in his mind every-which-way.
It
seemed like nothing mattered, nothing but work (his
escape).
He
couldn’t do the things he felt, set out to do…
He
felt denied! Almost shameful (as if he
was cracked)
When
he came home, she quickly ran upstairs to her bedroom to pray!
She
cried again, as often she did…
“I’ll
do anything for her,” he said, wiping sweat from his brow
((feeling
helpless)(hoping God heard))
And
she cried, in prayer saying: “We are children in the hands of
giants—and he must not meet defeat, at
the hands of children.”
#4121 (11-20-2013)
8) The Great Figure
of Industry (Power of the Minds)
“The silent patient power of money will bring
victory—” he told the
heads
of industry, those in the thinking room—
He measured accurately the power of the
people:
“We must,” he told them, “reassert our
ascendancy over their minds, —
it is the end, the struggle of minds.”
He personified, the messiah image, telling
all who met him, his great
ideas, for progress, industry,
and the people became under
His spell, influenced; his personality
fascinated one and all, or per near
all—
This great figure of industry, pointed the
people on another road, a new
and long road, his fortune; giving to his followers speculation and Dreaming.
And in time, four-years later, they came to realize,
he was simply
something else, a treeless forest, steady and never-ending, something
that arose to something else, vast and puffed up, but rhythmical, to the point
of sedating them to his way—as if hypnotic.
For a mighty moment he was like a chorus that
brought music to the
hearts of men…
It was if anything, a crude and short and
sort of intoxication.
In this great sturdy figure, the majority
cried: “He must not be denied
the fulfillment of its purpose” (and
so the majority chose him again—as if brainwashed)…
And many shook as with a chill—those who were
the lovers of Mary and
Jesus—
For a time, it seemed the air itself, pulsated,
and grew thinner and less:
factories and foundries, steel mills, and slaughterhouses closed, Small
and tall banks and all died out together, with the morals that once
were blessed.
Street after street, people wandered about
aimlessly; evening lights
were turned off, for lack of resources…
The country was black and grim; filled with
noisy hooligans, children
hungry and crying. Dogs howled, master-less: everywhere dirt and
Disaster.
The people asked: “What did we do wrong?”
“When you let someone take charge of your life
that is exactly what
they
do, and if, without accountability, it is always in their favor,” Said the
Poet!
#4122 (11-21-2013)
9) The Factory
District (The bottle and the Child)
The child sat on the post of a fence as
people walked by, she kicked
with her heels the side of the post, tears filled her eyelids, dripping
black
streaks, and stains down her cheeks—
“I want an apple,” she pleaded and bellowed,
staring at the cars and
people,
the brick walls and houses across the street…
She was the daughter of a janitor, a drunkard
who worked at the electric
company, down around the wide boulevard that ran through the Factory
district—
He was a big man, and there she sat, the
fates and divine intervention,
on her side; this man, maker of a child, this was his way.
She waited, looking over the faces, car
roofs, —impatient; then came to
her
ears, his voice: “You been waiting long?” he asked.
She smiled, said not a word, and followed him
back to their apartment,
like a puppy.
I am talking to you now—
She loved him, and was in contest to win his
love. Even though there
was no rival, or perhaps there was, the bottle: for he had centered His
life upon that item…
#4123 (11-21-2013)
10) Two Roads (“My Factory
grew
and grew—)
“The passion, depth and meaning, we each had
for one another, had
passed,” his voice became sharp as he talked to his son (he was
now an old man).
“Sentimentality had destroyed me,” he went on
to say, “yet loving a
woman saved me” (his wife
long passed on).
The young man, failed to understand, exactly
where his father was
headed with all this…
“My foundry grew and grew, so I had less time
for you, I was grateful to
your mother for she was the object of my love for you, and I had to
live with the beauty of that.”
The young man, not yet twenty, thought
silently on that, said inside his
brain, ‘There are two roads to take, he took one, and I shall take
another.’
The father waited as though for inspiration.
With a crooked twist, the young lad, turned
about, and walked away.
#4124 (11-21-2013)
11) A Stringer
of
Words (A definite purpose/the
old
painter)
Grandpa spoke in a harsh voice—he was a
racial but the things he said
were all true enough…
He was a workman (a painter
of houses and
buildings, etcetera)
A World War One Veteran...
A man’s kind of man—
He liked his vodka strong as hell (a hundred and forty proof)!
He had his faults though, he swore like a
mule driver, and if you let him,
he could kill dreams—
He helped my mother raise me.
I knew time was on my side, it would break
his direction, if indeed he
had one for me.
No one can see life at one great sweep—I
lived in a patchwork of life to
be: that is where God comes in…
There was something hypnotic about the quiet
strength of my mother—
of her mood.
Grandpa never saw the point, she did!
As I grew he did not. You see I was the
adventurer, the struggle to exist
could not be avoided, I had to follow my dream.
Why could he not understand that?
We should have been partners in that—;
bitterness swept over the old
painter: it came out of his soul!...
I do not know what he wanted from me, to be (if anything), —and now I
do not care; hence, I became a stringer of words (a poet—as fate
would have it).
#4125 (11-21-2013)
The author is a journalist, poet, and novelist: in essence a “Stringer
of Words”.
12) The Road of a
Soldier (without regret)
In the Army there is little to no disorder
and messiness of little to big
things…
“Let them try it if they wish!” the Drill
sergeant dares.
They want you to forget that sweet girl you
left in the cornfields bay in
Minnesota, or that gal you left in the big city, out east—wherever!
The beauty your life once created—is put on
hold (for dreams).
It is now the task one must (should)
consecrate their selves to:
soldiering!
Soldiers are to be like matadors in the
bullring.
No longer the plough maker or the mule driver
taking up the whip—
Point made, I am satisfied to let your
imagination rest, or stroll.
In towns, some towns, they call soldiers
drunkards, put up signs saying
“Keep off the grass”; in some countries they spit at you!
It’s not humorous…
With a sinking heart I say: should you
destroy the impulse of the
soldier, you destroy what you want him to be, a fighting and killing
Machine.
So let the few under the influence of drink
be, let them roar out of their
sandy throats all the dust and long time looking, thinking,
wondering, and excitement brought into a soldier’s head; for he has
no other escape!
When he turns out the lights at night, in his
room—far-far-away, unable
to
sleep, because he’s thinking—maybe with a moment of doubt, The truth of being a
soldier: remembering those silly insulting signs,
and those other smart remarks, and who but your family will put
your picture on the wall if you’re to die tomorrow, but your family! The
truth is, he says: “Is it worth it? This is all the youth I’ll ever have”
with courage he gives it up; did he make a mistake?
Let him be without regret.
#4126 (11-22-2013)
Note: Jesus said: “What greater
gift can man give, than his own life for another” (this is what the soldier
must be willing to do)
