Liberty Brass

I was sitting across from the rotating sign
For the Liberty Brass Turning Company

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And brooding about our fathers
Always on the make to make more money

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Tender wounded brassy unsystematic
Free American men obsessing about margins

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Selling every day of their God-damned lives
To some Liberty Brass Turning Company

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Until they were screwed into boxes
And planted in plots paid and unpaid

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Copyright © 2010 by Edward Hirsch. Originally published by The New Yorker, March 15, 2010, issue.