Fires —
Fires out of the dark —
(Coal-barges swing on the Ohio)
Fires, fires of Steel —
(Ore floats the ripple of the slow Monongahela)
Fires, fires of Pittsburgh —
Lo, lightnings lifting her sky of smoke, and dropping it,
Lo, the young American city,
On her heights, in the fork of her rivers,
And ringed with mills
Guarding her tracks and tonnage
Laboring day and night.
She is the womb of the Modern,
Strong young mother of cities and ships. . . .
She weaves the world with rails,
And webs the Earth with wires. . . .
Pittsburgh is Labor ,
Pittsburgh is Wealth ,
Pittsburgh is Power .
From these smokes, a nation,
From these fires, America.
O fires of Pittsburgh!
Is it only the Steel that shrieks as you twist and shape it?
Is this the howling of your hammers, the anguish of your cranes, the revolt of your engines?
Do I hear only this hell's music of mills?
Or is this the slaves' song of your lonely wrestlers with elemental flame and ore, —
The slaves' song,
The slaves' groaning and wailing in the dark,
The song of mastered men,
The sullen satanic music of lost and despairing humanity?
I will go lightly
By the lonely shanties clinging to the barren slopes. . . .
I will go softly
Where no birds sing,
Where the gas-lamps burn grey in the flimsy sodden milltown,
And from the lighted kitchens
The tired workmen throng the streets, tramping, tramping,
Tramping over the railroad bridge,
Tramping through the switch-yards,
For the Giant has blown his whistle
And the night-shift is on. . . .
Madly the night swirls
Lunging with engines —
The flames burst the roofs and shower golden snow,
The shrill-whistling yard-engines bump across the switches,
Switchmen swing lanterns, green, green, red,
The sudden headlights dazzle round the silhouettes of workmen,
This mill and that looms roaring, roaring,
Bells beat, whistles blow, shouts rise, and heaven
Rolls with unresting smokes,
Glares with livid lightning. . . .
Speed!
The young god speed!
The young god speed is at the wheel,
Whipping the engines,
Pacing the workers,
The mills roar their terrible triumph over time,
The great machines snatch at the hands of men,
And drag them in, and drag in the arms,
And drag at every muscle of the body. . . .
Speed! speed!
American speed!
Set the fires roaring,
Swing the blooms in faster,
Pile up the tonnage for a record-breaker,
Pile up the tonnage. . . . Strain, strain, you toilers!
Give us every ounce of your tireless energy. . . .
Work, till you crack, work till you are slag:
Work, till you age with fever and exhaustion,
Work, till we fling you out upon the rusty scrap-heap. . . .
Open slides the floor-door: the soaking pit is dazzling. . . .
Down comes the crane-hand and dips into the fire:
It's the ten-ton ingot she is lifting up,
It's the ten-ton ingot, white-hot and sizzling. . . .
It's a lost soul shrieking snatched from out the burning. . . .
Clank, clank, clatter, the bloom runs down the rollers,
Crash! it hits the wringers!
Whong! the sparks are flying!
Klong-al, klong-al, it howls like a lioness,
Giving up its soul as it flattens to a sheet. . . .
Noise, soot, chaos. . . .
I wander, finding men,
Half-naked men with wet shining bodies,
Men with forks, and men at the levers,
Men on cars, and men behind the engines,
Fire-glaring men with shovels at the furnaces. . . .
Men, men. . . .
I watch, and I am silent. . . .
(O dance of death!
Dance of the fires of death!
Fires, fires of Pittsburgh!)
There are hills, beloved, with mountain-gardens, —
There we grow roses, useless beautiful roses
For the delight of our souls. . . .
There is a room, beloved, on the city square, —
There we make songs, useless beautiful songs
As gifts to each other's hearts.
We have known how the body, like a bud,
Opens beyond Earth, and beyond riches,
Into vision, song, love. . . .
We have known the mystery of each other,
Clinging in the mystery of the Night,
With stars and long silence. . . .
There is a fire beyond fire. . . .
There is a fire in love
There is a fire in song. . . .
O Man, thou flame!
Thou who hast in thee this vague vision, this power of desire,
Hast thou traversed a planet with trade and speech,
Steel swimmers of the sea, steel cities capped with cloud,
Steel cannonades of destruction,
Steel strength of Civilization,
And yet, art thou darkness?
Psychic Giant!
Thou apparition appearing on a planet teeming with little animals,
Emerging strong from the twilight of storm-lost creatures,
Thou envisager of distances and ages,
Thou binder of elemental powers,
Thou tameless fighting god of Earth!
Art thou this, builder of Pittsburgh?
Why then this sighing in the abyss?
Why from thy grimy lips this slaves' song, this slaves' song in the fires,
This slaves' wailing and groaning,
This sullen satanic music of despair and death?
Art thou caught in thine own creation?
Giant, art thou locked in the arms of this Giant of thine own making,
This brainless Giant?
Are the two eternally wrestling,
Thou of the shanties clinging to the barren hills,
Thou of the tawdry mill-town
Wrestling with Steel, struggling with Tonnage, fighting with Time?
There is no glory in the world that coops thee here,
Giant of Labor,
There is no joy. . . .
There is no delight in the gaudy Heaven lit by the fires of this Hell,
No delight among the masters ever speeding,
No delight for the pilers-up of Power,
There is no joy in America. . . .
There can come no song for fine ears out of the sweating of the multitude,
There can come no splendor of the soul out of the grinding of the slaves. . .
But there comes madness,
There comes the rising whirlwind of riches.
There comes the hurricane-fury of lust to be great,
There comes a wind smiting nation against nation,
There comes confusion of tongues, and storm,
Storm whirling the towers, toppling the cities, blasting the countryside,
Storm shattering Civilization — the Abyss
Opens, a world goes down.
And thou, Labor,
Art sucked into the cyclone —
It is thy blood that must redden the fields of France,
It is thy breast and thy face that must stop the shells. . . .
Fires,
Fires out of the dark
(Coal barges swing on the Ohio)
Fires, fires of Steel —
(Ore floats the ripple of the slow Monongahela)
Fires, fires of Pittsburgh —
From these smokes, a nation,
From these fires, America. . . .
But that morning shall break
When the Sleeper in thy fires awakens,
But that morning shall break
When thy giant Slave rises and deals with thee. . . .
With a shrug of his shoulders, those flies, his masters, shall drop,
With a stroke of his terrible fist he shall clean out the mills,
He shall seize the machines, bestriding the engines that rode him. . . .
When that morning breaks
The Sun of Labor in splendour
Shall illume a new world,
When that morning breaks
This Giant shall call to the Giants
And the Nations be one. . . .
When that morning of glory breaks
The Earth's hosts arisen
Shall be streaming with light. . . .
Song shall burst from their lips,
And flame out of darkness. . . .
Song shall leap from their lips,
And the glory
Be given to Man for his marring, his making, his death or his life.
Fires out of the dark —
(Coal-barges swing on the Ohio)
Fires, fires of Steel —
(Ore floats the ripple of the slow Monongahela)
Fires, fires of Pittsburgh —
Lo, lightnings lifting her sky of smoke, and dropping it,
Lo, the young American city,
On her heights, in the fork of her rivers,
And ringed with mills
Guarding her tracks and tonnage
Laboring day and night.
She is the womb of the Modern,
Strong young mother of cities and ships. . . .
She weaves the world with rails,
And webs the Earth with wires. . . .
Pittsburgh is Labor ,
Pittsburgh is Wealth ,
Pittsburgh is Power .
From these smokes, a nation,
From these fires, America.
O fires of Pittsburgh!
Is it only the Steel that shrieks as you twist and shape it?
Is this the howling of your hammers, the anguish of your cranes, the revolt of your engines?
Do I hear only this hell's music of mills?
Or is this the slaves' song of your lonely wrestlers with elemental flame and ore, —
The slaves' song,
The slaves' groaning and wailing in the dark,
The song of mastered men,
The sullen satanic music of lost and despairing humanity?
I will go lightly
By the lonely shanties clinging to the barren slopes. . . .
I will go softly
Where no birds sing,
Where the gas-lamps burn grey in the flimsy sodden milltown,
And from the lighted kitchens
The tired workmen throng the streets, tramping, tramping,
Tramping over the railroad bridge,
Tramping through the switch-yards,
For the Giant has blown his whistle
And the night-shift is on. . . .
Madly the night swirls
Lunging with engines —
The flames burst the roofs and shower golden snow,
The shrill-whistling yard-engines bump across the switches,
Switchmen swing lanterns, green, green, red,
The sudden headlights dazzle round the silhouettes of workmen,
This mill and that looms roaring, roaring,
Bells beat, whistles blow, shouts rise, and heaven
Rolls with unresting smokes,
Glares with livid lightning. . . .
Speed!
The young god speed!
The young god speed is at the wheel,
Whipping the engines,
Pacing the workers,
The mills roar their terrible triumph over time,
The great machines snatch at the hands of men,
And drag them in, and drag in the arms,
And drag at every muscle of the body. . . .
Speed! speed!
American speed!
Set the fires roaring,
Swing the blooms in faster,
Pile up the tonnage for a record-breaker,
Pile up the tonnage. . . . Strain, strain, you toilers!
Give us every ounce of your tireless energy. . . .
Work, till you crack, work till you are slag:
Work, till you age with fever and exhaustion,
Work, till we fling you out upon the rusty scrap-heap. . . .
Open slides the floor-door: the soaking pit is dazzling. . . .
Down comes the crane-hand and dips into the fire:
It's the ten-ton ingot she is lifting up,
It's the ten-ton ingot, white-hot and sizzling. . . .
It's a lost soul shrieking snatched from out the burning. . . .
Clank, clank, clatter, the bloom runs down the rollers,
Crash! it hits the wringers!
Whong! the sparks are flying!
Klong-al, klong-al, it howls like a lioness,
Giving up its soul as it flattens to a sheet. . . .
Noise, soot, chaos. . . .
I wander, finding men,
Half-naked men with wet shining bodies,
Men with forks, and men at the levers,
Men on cars, and men behind the engines,
Fire-glaring men with shovels at the furnaces. . . .
Men, men. . . .
I watch, and I am silent. . . .
(O dance of death!
Dance of the fires of death!
Fires, fires of Pittsburgh!)
There are hills, beloved, with mountain-gardens, —
There we grow roses, useless beautiful roses
For the delight of our souls. . . .
There is a room, beloved, on the city square, —
There we make songs, useless beautiful songs
As gifts to each other's hearts.
We have known how the body, like a bud,
Opens beyond Earth, and beyond riches,
Into vision, song, love. . . .
We have known the mystery of each other,
Clinging in the mystery of the Night,
With stars and long silence. . . .
There is a fire beyond fire. . . .
There is a fire in love
There is a fire in song. . . .
O Man, thou flame!
Thou who hast in thee this vague vision, this power of desire,
Hast thou traversed a planet with trade and speech,
Steel swimmers of the sea, steel cities capped with cloud,
Steel cannonades of destruction,
Steel strength of Civilization,
And yet, art thou darkness?
Psychic Giant!
Thou apparition appearing on a planet teeming with little animals,
Emerging strong from the twilight of storm-lost creatures,
Thou envisager of distances and ages,
Thou binder of elemental powers,
Thou tameless fighting god of Earth!
Art thou this, builder of Pittsburgh?
Why then this sighing in the abyss?
Why from thy grimy lips this slaves' song, this slaves' song in the fires,
This slaves' wailing and groaning,
This sullen satanic music of despair and death?
Art thou caught in thine own creation?
Giant, art thou locked in the arms of this Giant of thine own making,
This brainless Giant?
Are the two eternally wrestling,
Thou of the shanties clinging to the barren hills,
Thou of the tawdry mill-town
Wrestling with Steel, struggling with Tonnage, fighting with Time?
There is no glory in the world that coops thee here,
Giant of Labor,
There is no joy. . . .
There is no delight in the gaudy Heaven lit by the fires of this Hell,
No delight among the masters ever speeding,
No delight for the pilers-up of Power,
There is no joy in America. . . .
There can come no song for fine ears out of the sweating of the multitude,
There can come no splendor of the soul out of the grinding of the slaves. . .
But there comes madness,
There comes the rising whirlwind of riches.
There comes the hurricane-fury of lust to be great,
There comes a wind smiting nation against nation,
There comes confusion of tongues, and storm,
Storm whirling the towers, toppling the cities, blasting the countryside,
Storm shattering Civilization — the Abyss
Opens, a world goes down.
And thou, Labor,
Art sucked into the cyclone —
It is thy blood that must redden the fields of France,
It is thy breast and thy face that must stop the shells. . . .
Fires,
Fires out of the dark
(Coal barges swing on the Ohio)
Fires, fires of Steel —
(Ore floats the ripple of the slow Monongahela)
Fires, fires of Pittsburgh —
From these smokes, a nation,
From these fires, America. . . .
But that morning shall break
When the Sleeper in thy fires awakens,
But that morning shall break
When thy giant Slave rises and deals with thee. . . .
With a shrug of his shoulders, those flies, his masters, shall drop,
With a stroke of his terrible fist he shall clean out the mills,
He shall seize the machines, bestriding the engines that rode him. . . .
When that morning breaks
The Sun of Labor in splendour
Shall illume a new world,
When that morning breaks
This Giant shall call to the Giants
And the Nations be one. . . .
When that morning of glory breaks
The Earth's hosts arisen
Shall be streaming with light. . . .
Song shall burst from their lips,
And flame out of darkness. . . .
Song shall leap from their lips,
And the glory
Be given to Man for his marring, his making, his death or his life.
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