poem by Carl Sandburg
Hog Butcher
for the World,
Tool Maker,
Stacker of Wheat,
Player with
Railroads and the Nation's Freight Handler;
Stormy,
husky, brawling,
City of the
Big Shoulders:
They tell
me you are wicked and I believe them, for I
have seen your painted women under the
gas lamps
luring the farm boys.
And they
tell me you are crooked and I answer: Yes, it
is true I have seen the gunman kill
and go free to
kill again.
And they
tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the
faces of women and children I have seen
the marks
of wanton hunger.
And having
answered so I turn once more to those who
sneer at this my city, and I give them
back the sneer
and say to them:
Come and
show me another city with lifted head singing
so proud to be alive and coarse and
strong and cunning.
Flinging
magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on
job, here is a tall bold slugger set
vivid against the
little soft cities;
Fierce as a
dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning
as a savage pitted against the
wilderness,
Bareheaded,
Shoveling,
Wrecking,
Planning,
Building,
breaking, rebuilding,
Under the
smoke, dust all over his mouth, laughing with
white teeth,
Under the
terrible burden of destiny laughing as a young
man laughs,
Laughing
even as an ignorant fighter laughs who has
never lost a battle,
Bragging and laughing that under his wrist is the pulse.
and under his ribs the heart of the
people,
Laughing!
Laughing
the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of
Youth,
half-naked, sweating, proud to be Hog
Butcher,
Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with
Railroads and Freight Handler to the Nation.