Susan Shaw Sailer
Is there, can there be, anything worse than failure to protect those we have the responsibility to protect? Perhaps what’s worse is making money from that neglect and treating the death of human beings as “collateral damage.” This is the message of Susan Shaw Sailer’s chapbook Coal, soon to be released by Finishing Line Press.
Still thinking about BP executives making excuses for their horrendous oil spill, viewed again recently on CNN 60 Minutes, and still receiving daily messages about Occupy Wall Street, I opened the first page of Sailer’s manuscript and saw the names of the twelve miners killed in the Sago Mine disaster on January 2, 2006.
Today is January 2.
Now let me tell you a little about Susan Shaw Sailer. After retiring from the Department of English at West Virginia University, where she taught 20th Century Irish and British literature, she went back to graduate school herself and completed an MFA in Poetry at New England College in 2007. I’m proud to say that she was my classmate there.
Sailer’s poems, reviews and articles about poetry have appeared in many journals, including Poetry International, 5 A.M., Indiana Review, Prairie Schooner, Alehouse and others.
Below are three poems from Coal.
Irene Willis
Poetry Editor
Not One Damn Thing Went Right
Foam blocks supposed to keep escape ways safe
blew out like feathers from a busted pillow.
Trapped, the miners nailed that curtain to keep
the bad air out. What fool bought the kind that let
it in? Air packs to keep men breathing till help
comes—there weren’t enough for every man.
Packs didn’t work at all or made men breathe so
hard they thought they’d die. Guys that had them
ripped them off. That lightning strike they say made
the mine explode—thunder like grenades, lightning
so bright it lit the sky like August noon though night
was black. I just laid down, finished my shift at the mine.
I woke right up, drove back to Sago, twenty-five miles
away. Lightning never hits in January here. Old folks
say no storm ever was that bad. What’s worst, the guys
on rescue teams away for New Year’s Day—it took two
days to make two teams, get in the mine, clear the cave-
in. Twelve men dead long before they got there.
Too Small to Be a Dot on Maps
Rusted exhaust pipes, buildings pastel blue
against gunmetal sky—old Sago Mine.
The bridge across Buckhannon River leads
to new Sago Mine, closed since the explosion
January 2nd 2006. On the twelve-foot, padlocked
fence: Authorized Persons Only Beyond These
Gates. Safety Protects. Inside, cars and trucks:
two teams investigating causes—safety experts,
ventilation engineers. The coal tipple, small
cone of coal, two-story-high earth movers,
giant lumber piles—extras on the scene, waiting
to be called. Week five, and the twelve, dead.
Coal Mine Museum Guide
Says he ran the twin-head roof bolter.
Explains to visitors the bolter drilled
deep holes in the roof, shot in a mix
of resin and glue, twisted bolts to hold
the plates that stop roof cave-ins. Says
it’s in his blood to mine. He went down
at seventeen, recruited out of high school.
“No need for no diploma. You’re strong,
smart,” the mine recruiter told him. First
he worked the shuttle car, moved coal
chunks from where the miner spewed them
out to the feeder, proud how many tons he’d
move each shift. “We was the best,” he tells
us, “got more coal out than any other team.
A mile down that noisy dark all you’ve got’s
your wits, your buddies. You don’t want no
cowboys. You go in together, out together. If
there’s an accident you fight to live together—”
points to his right arm hanging, crushed in
a roof cave-in. Both his kids went to college.