Mark Nowak's new poetry collection, "Shut Up Shut Down," deals with deindusrialization and the effect on workers' lives. The St. Paul resident grew up in Buffalo, New York, and witnessed vast economic changes that transformed his family and his community.

Nowak is profiled in a recent issue of City Pages. Read the profile.

Here is a selection from his poem, Capitalization:

16.
Former controllers are driving cabs
in Lansing, Mich., selling bathroom fixtures
in Long Beach, Calif., hanging wallpaper
in Atlanta, pipefitting in Drexel Hill, Pa.,
baking in Honolulu, roughnecking
in the oilfields of Oklahoma,
substitute teaching in Hot Springs, Ark.,
selling cars in Detroit
and underwriting life insurance in Baltimore.
When I peddled eggs in East Pittsburgh,
I?d meet up with many people
who worked at Westinghouse.
They greeted me like an old and trusted friend.
They?d say, "Margaret, if you tell us
those eggs are fresh, we know they?re fresh."
I thought: It?s good to have
that kind of reputation. It?s good
to be able to look people in the face,
to shake a worker?s hand
with no need to apologize.
Capitalize both parts of a hyphenated word
if each part is ordinarily capitalized:
Anglo-American attitude
Scotch-Irish ancestry
anti-American

Nowak's books can be purchased locally through unionized bookstores such as the Resource Center of the Americas and the Uptown Borders, and through powells.com, a unionized online bookstore. Click here to use our link to powells.com.