Trickle Down

you cease to smell the steel plant after you've lived here for a while
 smoke is snow is ash are leaves that blow through the air aloft
 and all our houses dim their siding to the same soot grey style
 and we hang our laundry out on sundays when they turn the furnaces off
 and everybody's daddy works up on the line
 the steinbrenners and the wilczewskis have been here the longest time
 and everybody's mommy squints into the sun
 sunday afternoon after all the laundry's done
 sometimes a distant siren can set a dog to barking late at night
 and then it dominos on down 'til every dog is joining in
 and the first rumors of the lay-offs sang like a distant siren might
 and we all perked up our ears and paced the fence of the ensuing din
 and every night we were glued to the tv news at six o'clock
 'cause it was hard to tell what was real and what was talk
 and they explained about the cutbacks all with earnest frowns
 but what they didn't say was that the plant was slowly shutting down
 this town is not the kind of place that money people go
 they make their jokes up on the tv about all the snow
 and they're building condos down river from where the plant had been
 but nobody really lives here now that the air is clean
 and the president assured us that it was all gonna trickle down
 like it'd be raining so much money that we'd be sad to see the sun
 mr. wilczewski's brother had some business out in denver so they left town
 everybody knows they were the lucky ones
 you cease to smell the steel plant after you've lived here for a while