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    We Are the Ones We've Been Waiting For

    Mill rat, hard hat

    I used to pour steel down by the river

    Working double shifts, having family rifts

    Burnt skin

    Meant the rent would be paid

     

    I was standing in a ring of fire

    When my fifteen minutes of fame came to call

     

    I wrote a book on sports

    Controversial

    But not enough to end up in the courts

    I had to work it

    When I wasn’t working

    Every time I got a day off

    I was on a plane

    Like James Brown’s “Night Train”

    Atlanta, Birmingham, Philly and DC

    LA, Kansas City, Chicago, Houston too

    What’s an Ohio boy to do?

     

    Do interviews

    Be on the news

    Get up early for TV shows

    Stay up late for guest DJ flows

     

    I even wrote two guest pieces

    For the New York Times

    All the news that’s fit to print

    Now included me

     

    Yes, the welcome mat was out

    But at an angle

    The editor there said

    Right to my face

    “I had no idea a steelworker could write so well”

     

    He asked me where I went to college

    Where did  I get my knowledge?

    When I said I didn’t finish high school

    That I had no cherished “my school”

    He thought I was lying

    He suddenly stopped trying

    To connect with me

     

    Back in the mill

    It was another story

     

    A tap on the shoulder

    “Someone’s here to see you”

    Over from the furnace

    Down from the crane

    Working the rails

    Now in from the rain

    They came up to my platform

    Awkward

    Uncomfortable

    “You’re the guy I saw on TV

    I thought you might understand”

    They put a poem or a tape or a drawing

    In my burned, calloused hand

     

    Come out, come out wherever you are

    We were made for life’s journey

    We were born to go far

     

    My friend Cristina

    Was filled with music inside

    Four kids, two jobs

    She never got to take it for a ride

     

    So it fell a generation

    And landed with a thud

    Her son Hector

    Was the living, breathing incarnation

    Of Chuck Berry’s Johnny B. Goode

     

    Hector could play a guitar like ringing a bell

    Had perfect time

    A knack for rhyme

    His songs could beautify hell

    But….

    His pants were so low

    His bald head so mean

    He got a gang jacket

    At the age of fourteen

    Kept doing time

    Nowhere to be seen

     

    So Hector’s gift was tested

    From below and above

    Bands fell apart, he put ‘em back together

    To play the songs that he loved

     

    One night in the IE

    He had a party for his new CD

    I danced with Cristina

    So I could hold her

    While I told her:

    “When Hector starts to play

    I love to watch you sway

    In front of your creation”

     

    Come out, come out wherever you are

    We were made for life’s journey

    We were born to go far

     

    I was in an airport

    Waiting out delay

    The lady sitting next to me

    Looked so familiar

    But I just couldn’t place her

     

    Then…

    There she was

    On the front page of the paper on my lap

    An Enron executive who’d lost it all

     

    “I feel like a victim”

    The article said

    “A victim of economic terrorism!”

    That’s what I read

     

    I lost my pension

    Not to mention

    “I almost lost my mind”

     

    I tapped her on the shoulder

    The words they just rushed out

     

    “I always thought that everyone on an upper floor

    Was just a whore”

     

    Her head snapped back

    Her anger flashed

    She turned my other cheek and slapped it with her voice

    “Just a whore?”

     Then a sigh, volume down

    “Just a whore?”

    “Not any more.”

     

    She turned away 
    But I couldn’t miss what she’d been doing

    With sketch pad and colored pencils

    Deep, dark, and dripping

    Bent low but spirit strong

     

    Come out, come out wherever you are

    We were made for life’s journey

    We were born to go far

     

    So many of us just accept our place

    We listen to the voices who say that just a few

    Are worthy of a critic’s taste

     

    Who are these gatekeepers

    Who claim we got nothing to say?

    These grant givers

    High livers

     

    Why do we seek their approval?

    Instead we should seek their removal

    Because our dreams can’t come true

    Tucked away in unread pages

    Or nestled in the notes

    Of silent, stillborn rages

     

    We are the ones we’ve been waiting for

    The next voice you hear will be your own

     

     

    Poem / 2006

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