Once We Made Things

Bethlehem Steel Shipyard and Steel Mill, in Sparrows Point, Baltimore, MD _{(Credit: Baltimore Museum of Industry)}

Originally written March 31st, 2023. Inspired by the song “The Last Ship” by Sting

The old man stared at me softly,
The lights of the last ship in his eyes
As it slipped into the darkness,
He and his brothers on the Point
Having poured the last of their souls
Into that mass of steel and hope.

And when he spoke, it was rumbling, and deliberate.
His voice carried the faintest of Irish accents,
His mannerisms learned from his father’s father.
He told me,

“There was nothing for us to do,
But wait for our fathers and brothers
To return home in caskets draped with flags,
For the rifles cracking at their funerals,
And how to learn to live with holes in our souls.
A ship can’t sail with holes.
The icy water comes rushing in,
Dragging the sailors to the domain
Of great powers we’ve long thought conquered.”

He shifted in his seat,
It creaked as he moved.
So did he.
His lips let slip a raspy cough,
But he clears his throat and presses on,
His voice not lacking severity or clarity.

“Back in those days, after the war,
Our fair city hadn’t a society to speak of.
Sure, there were those with fancy houses in the square,
But they never toiled like we did.
The Irish and Italians and Polacks and Greeks.
They never worked the yards,
Put hammer to steel, laid the timber.
Their lives weren’t affected when the yards fell silent,
And we were all sent packing.
You see, boy, once we made mighty things.
But there are no more ships to be made here.
Only old men to remember days gone by,
and rusting iron buried underground.”