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The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work: The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work

The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work
The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work

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Notes

table of contents
  1. The Book Of Jobs: Poems About Work
  2. Praise for The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work
  3. Introduction
  4. Painter / Zita Murányi
  5. My Grandfather Dug Coal / Sharon Perkins Ackerman
  6. Triangle Waist Company / Susan Aizenberg
  7. At the Grave of Patrick Kelly / Derrick Austin
  8. The Photographer / John Peter Beck
  9. Volunteer Firefighter, Antigua / Mihir Bellamkonda
  10. My Mother Taking Over My Father’s Package Store / Joan Bernard
  11. Remote Layoffs / Jennifer Blackledge
  12. The Farmer Speaks to Her Children of Work / Todd Boss
  13. Laundry / Mark Brazaitis
  14. The Addiction Counselor Considers Her Job While Reading Leaves of Grass on the Bus / Gloria Bromberg
  15. Oh radiant happiness / Sarah Browning
  16. Today’s Objective / Mary Lou Buschi
  17. Manifesto / Lauren Camp
  18. It's Academic / Gary Ciocco
  19. Fit Check / Andrew Collard
  20. A Woman’s Labor / Geraldine Connolly
  21. Pack Horse Librarian / Ginny Connors
  22. The Dunk Tank Clown / Joseph Cooper
  23. Résumé / Heather Coughlin
  24. Patty’s Charcoal Drive In / Barbara Crooker
  25. Upon Googling My First Job Looking for Evidence / Jim Daniels
  26. 24 Hour Concern / Colin Dardis
  27. Aubade Again / Shira Dentz
  28. Wood Harvesting / Dolo Diaz
  29. My Uber Driver / Mitch Ditkoff
  30. Picking Up Steam / Liz Dolan
  31. Smoking On Break Diptych Third Shift / Sean Thomas Dougherty
  32. Aluminum Apple / Zach Eddy
  33. May 21 / E.M. Palitha Edirisooriya
  34. [My mom carries me, her child,] / Kevin Ekeh
  35. Immigration Raid, 1978 / Terri Kirby Erickson
  36. People Say “I Could Never Do Your Job” / Yvonne M. Estrada
  37. The Sower’s Lament / Leila Farjami
  38. Working Hands / Arvilla Fee
  39. Advice, for Men, on Ironing / Gary Fincke
  40. Women’s Wear Daily / Ann Fisher-Wirth
  41. Swimming / Molly Fisk
  42. My Student Asks Me How I Know / Jennifer L. Freed
  43. Elegy for Uncle Christopher / Cal Freeman
  44. On the first day of our nonfiction unit / Monica Fuglei
  45. Two Dollars and a Spine of Steel / Sanjay Ganesan
  46. Epidemiology at 5 p.m. / Katy Giebenhain
  47. Active Threat Plan / Marissa Glover
  48. Two Deaths / Deux Mortalités / Emily Goldsmith
  49. Mother’s Earth / Susana Gonzales
  50. Time and the Clothes Line / Jessica Greenbaum
  51. Dad Goes to Work / Kelle Groom
  52. Inclinations / Kari Gunter-Seymour
  53. #Best Life / Tresha Fay Haefner
  54. Agnodice / Bex Hainsworth
  55. Sacred / Marc Harshman
  56. Intensive Care / Gloria Heffernan
  57. when asked to read a poem for the Black History Month assembly, again / Matthew E. Henry
  58. My Dad’s Lunch Box / Donna Hilbert
  59. Exit Interview, January 1, 1863 / Le Hinton
  60. Lucky / Leslie Hodge
  61. Busking / John Hoppenthaler
  62. Employed / T.R. Hummer
  63. little things you remember / David Janey
  64. Framing / Ted Jean
  65. Cognitive Dissonance at a Major Research University / Julia Spicher Kasdorf
  66. Summer Help III / Emilee Kinney
  67. Retirement / Dorian Elizabeth Knapp
  68. Learning How Not to Choose a Lover / Dorian Kotsiopoulos
  69. Famine Roads / Richard Krawiec
  70. [in traffic approaching plain] / Haley Lasché
  71. Cleaning the Floor / Viola Lee
  72. Peaked T-Waves / Jean Liew
  73. Vocation / Alison Luterman
  74. 1974: Making the Beds at the Days Inn / Marjorie Maddox
  75. Good Friday, 2020 / Rachel Mallalieu
  76. Olivia Newton-John Riedell Roller Skates / M.R. Mandell
  77. Against Seven-Inning Doubleheaders and Starting Runners on Second Base in Extra Innings in Major League Baseball / Sandra Marchetti
  78. To the bartender who tends to more than just the bar / Annie Marhefka
  79. Paperboy: Special Edition / Steve McCown
  80. On the Painting of the Sistine Chapel / Michelangelo
  81. What the Donkey Knows About Labor / Jane C. Miller
  82. odd jobs / Leslie F. Miller
  83. Butter Stamp / Geraldine Mills
  84. The Sweater / Michael Minassian
  85. The Painter / Erik Moyer
  86. "Sorry I'm Late. I Ran Over a Bug." / Wyatt Mischler
  87. Lee Miller Sparks a Solar Flare / Simone Muench and Jackie K. White
  88. Elegy for the 30-Year Career / Erin Murphy
  89. Curtain Call / Renée K. Nicholson
  90. Simply Following Instructions / Benjamin Niespodziany
  91. [from …AGAIN] / Mark Nowak
  92. Inside (SF Firefighter) / Jon Obermeyer
  93. Ledger of Unseen Hands / Gloria Ogo
  94. The Union / Kathleen Ossip
  95. Saigon Guard Duty — 1970 / Jimmy Pappas
  96. Phone Solicitor / Kenneth Pobo
  97. Letter to a Route Named 2C / T.R. Poulson
  98. Subject: re: maternity leave / Stephanie Powell
  99. Boy Crazy / Vivian Faith Prescott
  100. 30 Seconds / Mike Puican
  101. Poetry Is Bourgeois / Ruben Quesada
  102. Underage / Susan Rich
  103. Everyjuan/x / R. Joseph Rodríguez
  104. In the Dynamometer Lab / Christine Rhein
  105. The Mapmaker / Sara Rosenberg
  106. Labor / Francine Rubin
  107. Once a Year / Turab Saiyed
  108. Prophet of Furnaces and Dust / David Salner
  109. Something Useful / Moudi Sbeity
  110. All the Empty Spaces / Jeff Schwartz
  111. Day’s Work / Sean Sexton
  112. Salad Bar / Marcus Silcock
  113. The Rock Garden / Michael Simms
  114. The Labor of Existing Here / Ashleigh Smith
  115. Who He Was / Anna Egan Smucker
  116. Privilege / Jennifer Sutherland
  117. The God of Small Deaths / Dustin Triplett
  118. The Union Organizer / Rabelani Tshidino
  119. Coffee, Lipstick, Turbulence / Veronica Tucker
  120. How a Community of Women / Cindy Veach
  121. KFC / Ryan Vine
  122. Word Problems / Jade Wallace
  123. Being Roommates with a Stripper / Jennifer Elise Wang
  124. I'm from a Time / James Washington
  125. The Makeover / Susan Weaver
  126. To Colleen, for Whom no Elegy Will Suffice / Sean Webb
  127. Working (not working) from home / William Webb
  128. Jimmy John’s in the Jackhammer Street / Gabriel Welsch
  129. Dangling in Mid-Air / Ed Werstein
  130. What I Should Have Said on a Dark Sky Excursion with My High School Physics Teacher / Dick Westheimer
  131. Reflections on the Waitress Barbie / Karen J. Weyant
  132. Elegy for Driving Around / Corrie Lynn White
  133. Body / André Le Mont Wilson
  134. Assignment For My Post-Pandemic High School Students, Who are So Very Careful / Tarn Wilson
  135. The Mover’s Wife / Francine Witte
  136. A Truth, a Lie, and a Photo / Carolyne Wright
  137. Grocery Store Seafood Ice Case / Allison Zaczynski
  138. Pewter / Erin Wilson
  139. Contributors’ Notes
  140. Acknowledgments

The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work

Edited by Erin Murphy

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Murphy, Erin, editor. The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work, Penn State Libraries Open Publishing, 2026. https://doi.org/10.59236/tboj

Except where otherwise noted, “The Book of Jobs: Poems About Work” edited by Erin Murphy is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0 International License.

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