I'd like to read a poem to you called, "The Strike."
And I figured if I was going to write a book about factory
workers, it had to have in it at least one poem where
there is a strike taking place.
In Spanish, the word for strike--
does anyone know what the word is in Spanish?
Huelga.
Huelga, right.
And in Spanish, when you say huelga,
it has a lot of meaning to it.
It's just not strike.
Huelga!
Not just give us better pay, but huelga!
Give me a way of providing for my family.
Huelga!
Help me send my children to school.
Huelga!
A good roof over their heads.
And so all those things come out when
you hear the word huelga in Spanish, which means "strike."
So I'm going to do something a bit risky here.
And I'd like to get the audience involved in the poem.
So if I go like this, what does that mean?
Huelga.
Huelga!
But remember, you've got to say it with feeling, all right?
You've got to say with your gut.
So how do you say it?
Huelga!
Exactly.
All right.
So here we go.
"The Strike."
"Under a Japanese maple to eat lunch with the crew,
Guillermo explained how last week, he worked overtime,
how large plates of glass had been replaced and that Mr.
Galdini refused to pay the Concord Glass
Company's disposal fee, how he had to pile the discarded glass
beside the dumpsters, how the 1/2-inch-thick plates,
even with their smooth, green edges,
cut with silent ease into his palms until the heavy glass
reflected the color of blood like the stained windows
in church.
The crew sat down in the damp shade.
And Miguel, as if he found honor in the silence of death,
slept on the lawn with a flower over his heart.
Levántese viejo!
You're not dead yet, yelled Guillermo.
Do you know what we need?
He asked.
Una huelga.
The workers looked up and inched away,
and their eyes zigzagged across the factory
like the crazed flies above the dumpsters.
Guillermo, from the pit of his muscled throat,
in a tone soft and deliberate, said one word, huelga,
and again, huelga, and again, huelga,
until the word raised the crew off the grass,
and they bent their knees and found a rhythm lost
in the work of blood and meat.
And the word took hold of their collars.
And the word dripped in the beads of sweat
across their brow.
And the word began to beat and pump like a fist.
Huelga!
Ándele.
Mr. Galdini finished eating lunch in his office
and leaned out the window, listened,
sliced his leftover sausage, stuck toothpicks
in the penny-sized bits, and walked outside with a pink tray
to offer his leftover links as their lunch.
Mr. Galdini squeezed Miguel's shoulder.
The crew became silent, a hymn lost
in the pews of an empty church.
And as Guillermo watched without words,
the men took the toothpicks, raised their hands
to salute Mr. Galdini, and swallowed the sausage."