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Clacking of iron wheels on tracks,
A train whistle piercing the night,
As grim rows of gray-shingled shacks,
Reveal signs of poor people’s plight.
Itinerant pickers live here,
Migrants come from a distant land,
Where living is even more drear,
And better futures can’t be planned.
It’s opportunity, they see,
For their children, education.
Daring to hope that there will be
A place for them in this nation.
Willing to labor in the glare,
Of open fields beneath the sun,
And meagre are the fruits they share -
Minimum wages for each one.
Benefits are not to be had,
In these jobs that no others seek,
Still, just to be here, they are glad,
Where prospects they don’t see as bleak.
Neither do they take for granted
What this great country guarantees.
May the roots be firmly planted,
For these hard-working families.
~
Rick Mack
~
September, 2004
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