By Jack Joseph Smith
Original Scan
AI Interpretation
This 'Last Chance' page turns from shaft and paycheck to the shank, the draw, a lie about being thirty four, men eating good to go to hell, and silver streaks that become a wedding lie.
The corrected text sharpens the moral landscape. Coal-country memory becomes a scene of self-invention, labor, and false brightness rather than simple nostalgia.
A third 'Last Chance' state that turns from the offer toward self-invention and false brightness. Past the shaft and 'Big paycheck,' 'The shank and the draw / ran all the way back / to the ground.' The speaker admits a fabrication -- 'I just lied about thirty four / from California' -- and recoils from the spectacle of 'two hundred and fifty / men eating good to go to hell.' The closing image discredits the coal itself: 'over the last Pennsylvania ridge / it wasn't even black anymore / Just those silver streaks you / knew were a wedding lie.'