The vacant Johnstown mills
aren’t sagging dinosaurs,
nor relics of the past;
can’t you see them?
They are bracing athletes –
sprinters kneeling in starting blocks,
waiting for the shot
to light their roaring furnaces
again for a grateful nation.
And while a city waits, we poets
focus on the tender details –
a stone wall leaning inward,
heat lightning in the distance,
the way a dripping ceiling
seems to drum the beginning
of an American anthem.
There is nothing melancholy
in the stillness of a mill,
only anticipation and pride –
call it Johnstown hope,
resilient, silent, and heavy,
always ready
always ready.