Industry

industry poem G. L. Ford Illustration by Shonagh Rae
Illustration by Shonagh Rae.

Then one day the workshop
was shuttered and
a bright, desiccant, metallic
soot took place from the pleasant
and hectic comings
and goings, and we
none of us recalled
what had been done
in there, maybe cutting glass or
pouring lead type or
crafting buttons from the nut
of the Tagua palm, but
anyway it was late, we’d
look it up later, but the later
it got and the darker, the less
we found we were able
to devote our minds
to anything beyond
the small and shrinking
circle we’d calculated
we could hope to defend

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Cite this Article

Ford, G. L. “Industry.” Issues in Science and Technology 42, no. 2 (Winter 2026): 32–33. https://doi.org/10.58875/IHHQ8658

Vol. XLII, No. 2, Winter 2026