FACTORIES IN THE BUCKET

Having read  KISSING  THE SHUTTLE by Mary Ann Mayer  made me aware anew of the dangers in those jobs. Mayer  writes about the increase in the Blackstone Valley of TB-- in part due to the custom of women using their teeth to pull the thread through the shuttle.  This poet historian also features pictures of open air schools for tubercular children  in Pawtucket.  This was at the start of the 20th Century and one such school  was on Summit  Street. Where were they and are there any remains of the building there?   This account made me  think again of how little we are told of the real history of our communities.   I often think about  that  cover up that passes for American History and  that we have been force fed.  When I see a  show on THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE which recounts the dark and oppressive  racist  realities of WORLD WAR I or one that details  Eugenics as promoted by Margaret Sanger and other elitists.  How strangely that story has  gotten twisted. Now it seems the truth can be told. Reading about the hazards of  mill work made me think  about and recall  my  family's experience in the factories of Pawtucket and Central Falls and Lonsdale. My mother started when she was only 14 years old sweeping out at Coats Mill on Lonsdale Avenue. My Aunt Anna started working at  Corning Glass Works when she was 19 years old.  She stayed there for 40 years and retired at the age of 59. That  was considered a very good job.  Corning  had a Union and raises and double time for Sundays. Here is a poem about class privilege. Something we  know everything about in Pawtucket. The Factories Margaret Widdemer--another  woman poet that we  are seldom  taught  and is rarely mentioned.

I have shut my little sister in from life and light    (For a rose, for a ribbon, for a wreath across my hair), I have made her restless feet still until the night,    Locked from sweets of summer and from wild spring air; I who ranged the meadowlands, free from sun to sun,    Free to sing and pull the buds and watch the far wings fly, I have bound my sister till her playing-time was done—    Oh, my little sister, was it I? Was it I? I have robbed my sister of her day of maidenhood    (For a robe, for a feather, for a trinket’s restless spark), Shut from Love till dusk shall fall, how shall she know good,    How shall she go scatheless through the sin-lit dark? I who could be innocent, I who could be gay,    I who could have love and mirth before the light went by, I have put my sister in her mating-time away—    Sister, my young sister, was it I? Was it I? I have robbed my sister of the lips against her breast,    (For a coin, for the weaving of my children’s lace and lawn), Feet that pace beside the loom, hands that cannot rest—    How can she know motherhood, whose strength is gone? I who took no heed of her, starved and labor-worn,    I, against whose placid heart my sleepy gold-heads lie, ’Round my path they cry to me, little souls unborn—    God of Life! Creator! It was I! It was I! To lighten the mood, I offer a sort of comic  take on an Irish style poem by the same  poet. Another poem  by Margaret Widdemer  IRISH LOVE SONG. Well, if the thing is over, better it is for me, The lad was ever a rover, loving and laughing free, Far too clever a lover not to be having still A lass in the town and a lass by the road and a lass by the farther hill -- Love on the field and love on the path and love in the woody glen -- (Lad, will I never see you, never your face again?) Ay, if the thing is ending, now I'll be getting rest, Saying my prayers and bending down to be stilled and blest, Never the days are sending hope till my heart is sore For a laugh on the path and a voice by the gate and a step on the shieling floor -- Grief on my ways and grief on my work and grief till the evening's dim -- (Lord, will I never hear it, never a sound of him?) Sure if it's done forever, better for me that's wise, Never the hurt, and never tears in my aching eyes, No more the trouble ever to hide from my asking folk Beat of my heart at click o' the latch, and throb if his name is spoke; Never the need to hide the sighs and the flushing thoughts and the fret, And after awhile my heart will hush and my hungering hands forget . . . Peace on my ways, and peace in my step, and maybe my heart grown light -- (Mary, helper of heartbreak, send him to me to-night!) AS THE NUNS OFTEN TOLD US THE SPIRIT IS WILLING BUT THE FLESH  IS WEAK.  HOORAY!