Mission Tire Factory, 1969 Poem by Gary Soto
Mission Tire Factory, 1969
All through lunch Peter pinched at his crotch,
And Jesús talked about his tattoos,
And I let the flies crawl my arm, undisturbed,
Thinking it was wrong, a buck sixty five,
The wash of rubber in our lungs,
The oven we would enter, squinting
---because earlier in the day Manny fell
From his machine, and when we carried him
To the workshed (blood from
Under his shirt, in his pants)
All he could manage, in an ignorance
Outdone only by pain, was to take three dollars
From his wallet, and say:
"Buy some sandwiches.You guys saved my life."
the real poetry is conscience transcending what we make of moments -of events that it seems to us as real as it gets -we take them with us because we need them to be real -then conscience everlasting gets into a poem where the real thing is... you put it there in this poem my brother
Gary Soto takes us into the dark & dangerous world of work from his youth. The gritty, bleak mood & tone reminds me of John Steinbeck's 'In Dubious Battle'
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
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4/26/2024 9:34:43 AM # 1.0.0.1119
the real poetry is conscience transcending what we make of moments -of events that it seems to us as real as it gets -we take them with us because we need them to be real -then conscience everlasting gets into a poem where the real thing is... you put it there in this poem my brother