John Beck has earned an Honorable Mention in Streetlight’s 2023 Poetry Contest

The Driver

In 1925, Pius XI made you,
St. Frances, the patron

of all car drivers. I am sure
the Pope could not have imagined

the enormity of the job
he had given you. It is

your heavenly mission
to make my job easier.

Every night that I drive
for Uber and Lyft, please watch

over the pedestrians who try
to die on my bumper

and save their unworthy souls.
Please bless me when I am

without space
between cars

as I move lanes. Extend
to me your grace

when I pass the cop car
doing twenty over

and your fount
of patience

when I miss the yellow.
Frances, Pope Pius believed

that drivers could use
a saint like you

who always had
an angel just ahead

as I move lanes. Extend
to me your grace

when I pass the cop car
doing twenty over

and your fount
of patience

when I miss the yellow.
Frances, Pope Pius believed

that drivers could use
a saint like you

who always had
an angel just ahead

lighting the next turn
of the path.

Along with you,
I trust the angel’s voice

on my GPS
and the nightly magic

of streetlights winking
on as dark descends.

John Peter Beck is a professor in the labor education program at Michigan State University, where he co-directs a program that focuses on labor history and the culture of the workplace, Our Daily Work/Our Daily Lives. During Covid, he started a series of poems mining the intersection between occupations and their Catholic patron saints. The intersection allowed him to explore workplace events and issues—first day on the job, last day on the job, injury and sexual harassment to name a few. His poetry has been published in a number of journals, including The Seattle Review, Another Chicago Magazine, The Louisville Review, and Passages North, among others.