-the worth of some things-

From my city, from the cloth trade,

The needle trade, the overpowering mills,

The smoke of their stacks, particles of ash,—

Particles of cotton, the colors of dyes,

Evaporated drops of sweat, strains of muscle,

Bloodshot eyes,

Entrenched behavior,—  the tedious labor,

Came an incalculable diligence.

My mother and her sisters labored

At their sewing machines making hats,—

Fedoras, mostly of cloth, hats sometimes of straw,

A dense, pliable straw more clay than of straw.

"Bundles" were delivered

To the tenements we lived in twice a week.

This was Homework to the textile worker,

A practice of work-at-home, often forced-

Voluntary, now illegal. 

Neck-high, cavern-deep corrugated boxes

Filled with leather bands

And sheaves of thin wire to be threaded

Through the loop of the leather forming the band

End to end with the wire press-fitted
Into a little transparent plastic sleeve which held
The band securely for the morning's sewing.

These were assembled by all of us as we watched

Nighttime television.

In the early morning, the Bundles were collected by truck

Dispatched from the Mill.

Then we walked to school, me, my brother and my sister;

My father left for work selling liquor "down the Cape" 

And my mother and her sisters

Went to work at the sweltering Wagner Hat Shop.

They sewed the leather bands into

The sweeping Fedoras;—

The hats of Bankers and Laborers.

The hats of Grandfathers and Movie Stars.

The hats of the Wise-guys and the Bums.

These were the hats seen resting
On the Sunday pews;
The hats of the Bleachers, the Box-seats,

And the hats of the ranging Liquor Salesmen.

My young mother in the Mill, and us on the rug;
Her young sisters and their kids too,—
Made those hats.

                                               Quequechan