I Am Poem by Eric Cockrell

i am, become...
i worked your steel mills,
i walked the i-beams of your scrapers.
i dug deep in your coal mines,
i plowed your fields, picked your crops...
i picked your cotton, milked your cows,
worked your furniture factories,
in your cotton mills...
built your tracks, rode your trains,
popped your trucks, poured your concrete...

my sweat and blood, the foundation,
the nails in the wall!
i an America, the common,
and the magnificent...
i am the pulse, the breath, the beat.

i am the lover, the fighter, the dreamer...
i am the father, and the mother...
i am the sinner and the holy.
i am the truth, at all costs.

i am the man behind the wheel,
the dream behind the man...
the faith behind the dream...