Workers' Poem (2): Silk, a Pantoum

June 2023:

Synthetic silk sewing, stitching, scribbling the garment makers

—Smoke was pumped into the sky—as usual.

Fair factories formulating, fabulating, fabricating the model workers

—Tens of thousands a day–nothing beautiful.

As usual, smoke was pumped into the sky—

Jet-black soot—pigmenting the laborers' uniforms whole–

—Tens of thousands a day–nothing beautiful.

Cinder was conquering all bodily airways, leaving a reminder of reality.

Jet-black soot was pigmenting the laborers' uniforms whole–

Smog eddying into clouds—hair blowing behind them–like cigarette smoke.

Cinder was conquering all bodily airways, leaving a reminder of reality.

Rutted fissures etched into their faces–hands outstretched in surrender. 

Smog eddying into clouds—hair blown behind them—like cigarette smoke—

Heads vanished in the smog–minds perished of fumes and fog.

And faces–covered with rutted fissures–hands outstretched in surrender:

If there is hope, they say, it lies in these Proles.

Synthetic silk was sewing, stitching, scribbling the garment makers.