When you’re dead-broke, pushing pallets

in the dusty aisles of a cinderblock tomb,

till your back is stove up,

your coughs are black,

and your thoughts are frayed,

you can call on the Magic City outlaws

drop-forged in this smog-choked valley,

who scrapped with the Big Mules,

the gun thugs, and the scabs,

for their honor and their share of pay.

O, children, in the concrete and pines,

working with our hands and on our feet,

O, children, holding that holy old line --

in remembrance of the 40-hour week.

When you’re rent-strapped, threading symbols

through the pale rows of a flickering screen,

till your wrists are trashed,

your mind is static,

and your eyes are stung,

you can call on the Etowah outlaws

who worked and spun their fingers raw,

who walked out of red-brick caves

along the falling waters, and

into the light of a brand new day.

O, children, in the concrete and pines,

working with our hands and on our feet,

O, children, holding that holy old line --

in remembrance of the 40-hour week.

Seems like lately,

we get up

to go to work,

get ready for work.

We head to work,

and we work

till we get off work,

and take it to the house from work.

We hit the kitchen,

and we get to work.

We talk about work.

We worry about work.

We dream about it.

When you’re dog-sick, snatching plates

from the greasy jaws of this greedy Post-Life,

and the quicker you rush them out,

the quicker it gobbles them up,

and you gather what it spills,

you can call on the Tallapoosa outlaws,

who burnt their necks stooped to the Black Belt soil,

who raised hammer and hoe to the landlords,

hollering, God’s people shall eat of our own fields--

we shall eat of our own fields!

O, children, in the concrete and pines,

working with our hands and on our feet,

O, children, holding that holy old line --

in remembrance of the 40-hour week.