Our Schuylkill Mother

    Our Schuylkill Mother

Awake ! Wake up you Norfolk Southern Man
You slept too long on an old Pennsy plan
To keep public from our Schuylkill Mother's
North shore. A rusted railroad track covers
Her bosom, which nurtured first settlers here,
Who reached her banks by sweet waters clear.

Shout ! Shout out ! Release my river to me !
Our Schuylkill Mother's in jail. Set her free !

Long gone's that era of iron and coal -
Of black lunged miners who gave their soul
To fire hot furnaces that belched out bars
Which produced steel tracks and railroad cars.

No longer tire nor steel pulse Pottstown's veins.
The Twenty-First Century asks our brains
Fashion life new from the strengths of the past.

Schuylkill of birth, unlike us, you will last
So unborn heirs may enjoy your green banks,
Your freedom's required to merit their thanks.

Renaissance marries the mind to the heart.
Our responsibility - provide it - a fertile start.

       Ronald  C. Downie 

Another River poem,thought this one speaks to the crazy idea that Pottstown favors having a single spur rail line along the north bank separating the public from our Schuylkill River
which I refer to as Mother. This spur line must be abandoned, period.