Assembly Line
There’s so much space for rent, to buy
more than I’ve ever seen,
plenty of artists lofts
except this is a place where
art doesn’t hum,
no, this is a place where
machinery grinds, smoke peppers the
sky, sawdust rains like glitter
on overalls and black boots, scuffed,
splattered by paint,
no, here fingers are not
necessities and might end up
accidentally on the cutting
room floor because no one’s educated
enough to keep them on ice
until they can be sewed back on,
no, hands are just useful tools
to turn trees into something else
except our trees are being shipped
overseas now, the factories no longer hum,
we get steel boxes back of
stuff we didn’t make to sell
to people who aren’t working anymore –
now who’s gonna buy that?
© 2020 L.B. Sedlacek
BIO: L.B. Sedlacek is an award winning poet and author with poetry and fiction
appearing in many different journals and zines. Her latest poetry books are
The Adventures of Stick People on Cars (Alien Buddha Press), The Architect
of French Fries (Presa Press) and Words and Bones (Finishing Line Press.) She
is a former poetry editor for ESC! Magazine and also co-hosted the podcast for t
he small press, “Coffee House to Go,” for several years. She teaches poetry at
local elementary and middle schools and publishes a free resource for poets,
The Poetry Market Ezine. In her free time, LB enjoys swimming, reading,
and taking guitar lessons.
