The jail was built by workers for their friends
Who, sickened by the thought of work in shops,
Might take to jobs annoying to the cops.
Brick-layers built the stairway that descends
To dungeons, built the doorway that portends
Of bugs or floggings. Hunkies, Yankees, Wops,
Whose widows someday will be pushing mops,
May see their own sons here before life ends.

So old among us here this jail has grown
That even now there in the cells, in gray,
May be a man whose father built with stone
The high walls; one whose father hauled clay
For those dark bricks that close him in; or one
Whose father wired the gong that marks his day.