The working life is a staple theme of American poetry, probably since Walt Whitman recognized how central labor was to himself and others in the Brooklyn and Manhattan of the 1850s:

"Who has done his day's work? Who will soonest be through his supper?
Who wishes to walk with me?

Those seeking to answer the call of poetry in America found it impossible to earn a penny at it, so they went to work -- Robert Frost as a New England farmer; Dr. William Carlos Williams treating the working class of Paterson, N.J.; Wallace Stevens writing at night after days in an insurance company office; Edgar Lee Masters writing to escape the law firm he shared with Clarence Darrow; Frank O'Hara as an art curator at the Museum of Modern Art.

Before he escaped his home of Martins Ferry, Ohio, James Wright worked briefly at the Hazel-Atlas Glass works alongside his father, who was beaten down by years of factory work:

"All the proud fathers are ashamed to go home,
Their women cluck like starved pullets
Dying for love."

That's from "Autumn Begins in Martins Ferry, Ohio."

He also wrote, "My father died a good death. To die a good death means to live one's life. I don't say a good life."

The industrial past of Pittsburgh has inspired its share of poets -- Robert Gibb, Jan Beatty, Peter Blair, Judith Vollmer and Peter Oresick, who edited the anthologies "Working Classics: Poems on Industrial Life" and "The Poetry of Work," with Nicholas Coles, a University of Pittsburgh professor.

Detroiter Jim Daniels, who migrated here to teach at Carnegie Mellon, has been inspired in his poetry by his time working in a Ford factory.

All of these musings are an introduction to "Late for Work" by David Tucker (Mariner Books, $12), one of many new collections released during National Poetry Month.

Tucker is assistant managing editor of the Newark Star-Ledger, best-known as the newspaper of "The Sopranos" to TV watchers. Naturally I was curious about his newspaper poems scattered through his collection, winner of the Bakeless Prize from the Bread Loaf Writers Conference.

In keeping with the working-class theme, Philip Levine, another Detroit veteran of the auto plants, wrote the foreword.

Here's my favorite from the working life of the newsroom:

"Perspective"

The stories are forgotten before the paper starts to yellow.
Nobody remembers the name of the county executive
who swapped his city for a few thousand dollars and a three-piece suit.
Nobody cares whether the body in a trunk at the airport ever had a name,
and the dead in a Kansas train wreck are remembered
by a few relatives in a town near a bridge that isn't there anymore.
But once it was news and drove some slouchy reporter
to deadline as she hammered the keyboard without thinking,
throwing in every fact she could scrounge --
the weather, the smell of the air around the event,
the color of the smoke, the names of the victims, their ages, calling
on loud overheated words: unprecedented, shocking, blazing,
devastated and that old standby, stunned; bearing down
with minutes left until the presses rolled, holding nothing back.

That poem sums up the "romance" of deadline news writing as well as the ephemeral nature of the business; once the story is done, it's time to move on to tomorrow's news.

Tucker will not replace Williams as the greatest New Jersey poet. His approach, like a routine news story, is straightforward, without nuance, subtlety or lyricism, a bit like Billy Collins.

The average U.S. newsroom is not a glamorous place, but something magical happens in it every day, unseen to the uninitiated.

Give Tucker the curt nod of approval that passes for praise in this business for capturing some of that magic.

Wright festival

Back to James Wright. The poetry festival in his name in Martins Ferry brings in Campbell McGrath and Denise Duhamel for two days of readings and workshops April 28-29.

Both Duhamel and McGrath teach at Florida International University. He is known for his prose poems and has praised Wright in his book, "Road Atlas," while she is the author of "Queen for a Day," published in 2001 by Pitt Press.

Duhamel reads at 7:30 p.m. April 28 and McGrath at 7 p.m. April 29. Both will participate in discussions on literature and read Wright in day sessions April 29.

To learn more, call the Martins Ferry Public Library at 1-740-633-0314 or view the Web site at www.eastern.ohiou.edu/events.

As always, Annie Wright, the poet's widow, will deliver the opening remarks at the 26th annual festival.