Welcome to poetryvlog.com
A weekly video reading of poetry by the poet.
America
by Tom Karlson
The journey takes 54 minutes, 9 stops, and 11 miles
not the 70 days the Santa Maria needed to get from Palos to Bermuda
or the 10 years Ulysses took to get home from Troy
This train is not bound for glory
it is the Q traveling on steel
riding on the backs of Irish and West Indian sandhogs
Russian, Hungarian, and Mohawk steel workers
And Emma Lazarus’ invisible army of bridge workers and laborers
moving the tunnel through terminal moraine and granite
with pick, shovel, and powder--30 feet a day
3 years driving from Coney island
where New York bathes, eats, and laughs to
Rockefeller Center whose namesake
could buy and sell anything but the presidency
This morning car 3 carries 128
i-poded and ear free, sleeping and open eyed
birthed in 24 countries from 5 continents
speaking more tongues than can be found in an apple notebook
The 128 hold 73 different jobs
architect, porter teacher, student, nurse
baby and grand-mama ride this morning
from Brooklyn to Manhattan
Lady Liberty glances west, wipes her tears and smiles
she can hear the dreamless and the dreamers
the smells and sounds of diversity
this 21st century America
our america