Birth I wasn’t there When you were born. I was in a parking lot At L.L.Bean When we got the call. I was in Maine. It was four months after She passed away When you were born. It was two months later When I met you. Pepe and I drove to Virginia, My second time there. (There will be other times To describe the first.) One brilliant short week And then back to Maine. And then one month And then a long time Before we parted again. A very, very long time. The best time Of my life. The first year Of your life. *** 1st The Breakfast Club Gave you the bucket hat On your first birthday. You loved your time With them, A whole suite Of grandparents, Including Charlie, The oldest, The most frail, But you kept him Somehow young, For that brief moment in time. You toddled, And you blossomed; I don’t know, This whole year Floated along somehow, And so much seemed So natural. *** 2nd And in September We traveled up to Maine To stay with Pepe For a year And Mommy went To Korea In...
Truth, Justice, And the American Way... In 1938 Two Jewish men Published the first adventure Of Superman. Some have called his creation Wish-fulfillment, Not just for the lives His creators lived But for the era In which it happened. Elsewhere, There were other Jews Fighting a man Who dreamed of A different superman. Now, Oddly, These creators First envisioned Superman As a villain. It was only When forced To reconsider That he became A hero. A hero Who could Exhibit All manner Of great But relatively human Abilities. They created Many adventures For Superman Over the next several Decades. That’s kind of Forgotten. Today They’re only seen As the creators, Not as active Participants In his history. One in which Eventually, Superman Passed into The hands Of others And they lost All control And it even seemed Credit. And it wasn’t For many years Until they got that back. And then, Not until their twilight years, ...
You don’t need whips To be a despicable boss, Slavery doesn’t need chains To be reprehensible, You don’t need to forcibly import the labor To have a workforce that needs to be freed. It’s not good enough to say, “Well, no one else wants to do it.” If you create the conditions Where that’s even possible, Intentionally or otherwise, Of course that’ll be the result. But you need voices Willing to point this out. The unspoken, The thing So easily taken for granted, Is wrong Regardless, And will always need Correcting. On this soil Or elsewhere, Dignity is a language That must always be Defended.
Comments
Post a Comment