THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT: A poem for the workers

A poem for the workers

This poem was found in comments on the article about undocumented workers in the NY Times of 12/6/18. It was posted by C Whiting.

I make your bed.

I clean your toilet.

I carry the insults you heap

on hardworking people like me

across my aching shoulders.

I wear your little flag pin

and know that I am part of a game,

a performance,

a hoax.

I scrub the orange makeup

from the collar of your shirt

and your voice rises in anger

because those stains

tell a stubborn truth,

about the mask you wear.

I have no power over my own story.

You have changed and abused

and distorted my truth

for your own convenience,

so that from your lips

I am no longer a survivor,

courageous, industrious, human.

Instead, I scrub your toilet

and the words

criminal,

“illegal,”

rapist

drug-dealer

ring in my ears.

Scrub.

Enough.

// posted by montag @ 1:48 PM

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