AMERICAN GLUE FACTORY
for Rachel Carson
Your whole childhood you watched old horses
File up a cleated wooden ramp into the factory
Down the road and file out as smoke.
This was in Springdale, Pennsylvania,
Up the Alleghany from Pittsburgh,
At the beginning of the twentieth century.
What a pleasant name, Springdale. Summer nights
The stench of burning horses drove you inside
From the porch where you’d sat reading.
It was then you learned that something
In the air can close a story. You knew
From the sign along the road, AMERICAN GLUE
FACTORY, what the horses were being turned into.
On your desk was a bottle you used to join this
And that to this and that. Horses were what held
The gold and silver stars in the firmament
Of your notebook, and what made the hearts
Stick to the Valentine you never gave that girl.
Sitting on your bed, watching the horse-smoke
Obscure the stars, you thought of how much
The air can bear in its arms, and how a ramp
Is the simplest and cruelest invention.
But most of all you thought about how
There must have been a time when
There was no such thing as glue
Because, the world being whole,
There was nothing broken to mend.
for Rachel Carson
Your whole childhood you watched old horses
File up a cleated wooden ramp into the factory
Down the road and file out as smoke.
This was in Springdale, Pennsylvania,
Up the Alleghany from Pittsburgh,
At the beginning of the twentieth century.
What a pleasant name, Springdale. Summer nights
The stench of burning horses drove you inside
From the porch where you’d sat reading.
It was then you learned that something
In the air can close a story. You knew
From the sign along the road, AMERICAN GLUE
FACTORY, what the horses were being turned into.
On your desk was a bottle you used to join this
And that to this and that. Horses were what held
The gold and silver stars in the firmament
Of your notebook, and what made the hearts
Stick to the Valentine you never gave that girl.
Sitting on your bed, watching the horse-smoke
Obscure the stars, you thought of how much
The air can bear in its arms, and how a ramp
Is the simplest and cruelest invention.
But most of all you thought about how
There must have been a time when
There was no such thing as glue
Because, the world being whole,
There was nothing broken to mend.