Ryerson Steel ~ A steel fable in the passage of history

"All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is a constant pressure to make people feel they are helpless, that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions and to consume."  ~ Noam Chomsky


These were the days that steel begot
when labor unions had plenty of clout
and many useless workers, the lazy
and the drunk were assured
of wages
(when "minimum" was just about "enough"),

there were, then, men who had a work ethic
and worked for three, regardless of Stelazine, Thorazine
shock treatments and other such hallmarks
of bipolar treatment in the decades when insurance
was part and parcel of "earned wages",

my father was one such man, a shear-operator
from Hungary who made precise calculations on pencil and paper
with only an eighth grade education

it is said that nothing stays the same except change
and the steel industry is a fossil, a relic of a time
that came to be and came to pass--a throwback to
an era when houses with two-car garages
were being built for two-income families,

bigger and better was the American Way
all the while, the domino effects of omission and commission became
evident as companies went overseas
and even unions had their hands tied behind their backs

big business was looming in multi-national conglomeration holdings
and thus it came to be that banks lied
(Chomsky didn't!)
and money was the rediscovered God

and the streets of America are no longer paved with gold.