Eisenberg, Susan

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Labor Research Review 
Volume 1 | Number 12 
Up Against the Open Shop: New Initiatives in 
the Building Trades 
Article 8 
1988 
Question 
Susan Eisenberg 
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© 1988 by Labor Research Review 
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Abstract 
Poem 
Keywords 
union, organizing, construction, Susan Eisenberg, poetry 
This article is available in Labor Research Review: https://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/lrr/vol1/iss12/8 
I 
New Initiatives in the Building Trades 49 
Question 
When will these arms 
that can raise 
from a cavity fa the earth! 
complex interfacings of concrete/steel/wood/pipe/wire 
that have function 
that stand against gravity 
against time— 
wizardry we name 'buUding*-
when will these arms 
marbled with the genius 
to perform miracles, ask themselves the question 
every two-year-old repeats incessantly: why? 
VAy' hotel rooms with gold faucets 
when thousands are homeless? 
'why' tourist trinkets flaunted 
in glass-arched boutiques 
and elderly hidden in windowless rooms? 
4wby* a planet hostaged 
to nuclear reactors, ignoring 
humbler solutions: sun wind earth? 
When will these arms 
that craft and construct 
link elbows with the homeless . 
with the silenced 
with the future 
and ask why 
with the full thunder of their power! 
Susan Eisenbcrg ® 


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