Glasgow 1933 Poem by Michael Cochrane

The men working on the ships in the yards, hammer and rivet across the river Clyde.
The ice floats by as pulses beat to the constant machine gun noise.
Men with hard hands, some with love and hate on the knuckles, mould the steel, each breath plumes in the frosty morning.
Men in cloth caps, shaking and sweating, in claustrophobic conditions, create liners for the wealthy to hob nob and waltz across the Atlantic sea to New York.
At five o clock they stop in their thousands, out they exit through south street, walking over wet cobbled streets.
Home to a tin bath and wash away the grime and sleep foetal until the silence is broken by the clock alarm.
Michael Cochrane ©️ 2026