The barber was able to provide for his family,
even during the long haired trend of the sixties.
He helped others in his trade better provide
for their families by being instrumental,
in organizing the valley’s first barber’s union.
He cut generations of the same family’s hair.
There were boy’s first haircuts,
while they cried and screamed
in a booster seat in the barber chair.
There were elderly men living out their
“Golden years” in a nursing home.
At families’ requests he would go
to the area’s funeral homes
to cut a customer’s hair one last time.
These are the ways he was able
to give back to the local community.
Being a small business owner
with no pension or healthcare,
he worked as a barber for over fifty years.
He was near eighty when he retired.
After all those years of holding vibrating clippers,
he was left with a twisted arthritic hand,
which shows the record of his achievements.
In the end, if God rewards us by our scars,
the working-class people of this world
will have a VIP entrance through the pearly gates.
John Lennon: “A Working Class Hero” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMewtlmkV6c
“The most important word in the language of the working class is “solidarity.” ~ Harry Bridges
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