American Life in Poetry: ‘The Hot Dog Factory (1937)’

Grace Cavalieri, who lives in Washington, D.C., has performed a great service for American poetry over the past forty years with her public radio show, “The Poet and the Poem.” She’s also a playwright and a fine poet. Here’s a “field trip” poem from her book “With,” from Somondoco Press. “The Grace Cavalieri Reader” is available this month from Alan Squire Publications.

The Hot Dog Factory (1937)

Of course now children take it for granted but once

we watched boxes on a conveyor belt, sliding by,

magically filled and closed, packed and wrapped.

We couldn’t get enough of it, running alongside the machine.

In kindergarten Miss Haynes walked our class down

Stuyvesant Avenue, then up Prospect Street

to the hot dog factory. Only the girls got to go

as the boys were too wild.

We stood in line, wiggling with excitement as the man

talked about how they made hot dogs, then he handed us

one, and Jan dropped hers, so I broke mine in half.

This was the happiest day of our lives,

children whose mothers didn’t drive, and had nowhere

to go but school and home, to be taken to that street

to watch the glittering steel and shining rubber belts moving,

moving meats, readymade. I wish I could talk with Jan,

recalling the miracle and thrill of the hot dog factory,

when she was alive, before it all stopped—

bright lights, glistening motors, spinning wheels.

Poem copyright 2016 by Grace Cavalieri, “The Hot Dog Factory (1937),” from “With,” (Somondoco Press, 2016). Poem reprinted by permission of the author and the publisher. American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. We do not accept unsolicited submissions.