"Fence" by Jesse Welch
The fence closes off a closed mine
Sealing a place bankruptcy
Long since evacuated
The entrance to an exit
To a mine with no miners
But with miles of maze
Hardhat-high and hopeful for eternity
But completely empty
The newspapers can’t agree
A modern myth born of a lack of care
Or fact-checking
Or documentation
In 2002
Poor finances closed 100 men from their jobs
Maybe 150
At most 200 men every worked
Beneath the surface
But when fires burned underfoot in the 90s
300 of the evacuated
Capped off the smoke licking their heels
Devouring the very coal
We sought to make our supper
But the mythology agrees on one thing
That teenagers can read clearly
When the “high voltage” sign
Was put in place
By someone who hasn’t paid an electric bill
In 15 years
A barrier becomes a doorway
A fence to be scaled and summitted
Jacket pillowing the barbs at top
So your date won’t get their hands dirty
There’s so little to explore in a city
So little territory unmapped, unlogged,
Un-turned into a yoga studio
Daytime invitations are important to note
A torn fence
A broken lock
An entrance to a space forgotten
A capitalist catacomb
Reinventing itself in the hands
Of every kid who needs a space
To call their own
Who needs to be forgotten
Or to forget
Just for a moment
In a land of concrete and mirrors
And people on people on people
I could never stargaze growing up
Most stars I ever counted was 10
And 2 of them might have been the lights
On a cell tower
But the postal service
Never planned their walls well
So I’d lay on the asphalt
Between the tires of slumbering trucks
And watch the trains go by
Their wheels a prayer rattle
To somewhere new
To finding a space to breathe
In a claustrophobic wonderland
When I walk to work each day
I pass a break in the wall beneath a bridge
A half torn fence beckons its doorway
The KEEP OUT sign has fallen
Has rusted
Hasn’t been moved in years
I’ve grown too old to run away
But it’s nice to be invited
JESSE WELCH is a Chicago slam poet currently residing in Pittsburgh. He is the director of Young Steel, Pittsburgh's award-winning youth poetry slam, and the co-founder of the Nasty Slam, Pittsburgh’s Head-to-Head deathmatch slam. Once the 28th ranked slam poet internationally, he represented Young Chicago Authors at National Poetry Slam (NPS) 2009, Seattle Poetry Slam at NPS 2013 as the Seattle Poetry Slam Grand Slam Champion, and Pittsburgh at NPS 2015. He has been performing his poetry since he was 12 years old, and appears in the award-winning documentary Louder Than A Bomb.