COVID: What the Under-classes Know; What the Middle-classes must learn.

 



In his wonderful book of poems "How to Love a Country";  (Beacon Press Books, 2019), Richard Blanco has this to say in his marvelous poem "Declaration Of Interdependence" :

"We're a father in a coal town who can't mine a life any more because too much and too little has happened, for too long"

African American peoples know the truth of this very well:  "too much and too little has happened, for too long".  

Let's say: "ever since the first enslaved persons were shoved onto American soil".

Poor white peoples in Appalachia, and in every American City,  know the same truth: "too much and too little has happened, for too long".

Now COVID 19 has been shoved onto our soil. COVID 19 which knows no boundaries of race, status, or class. 

COVID 19 bringing with it a warning to the prosperous middle classes. "Your savings and life styles are not vaccinations". 

But maybe COVID 19 can inoculate you from lazy and dangerous thinking re poor whites;  and about the descendants of those who were enslaved. 

I remind you that "your savings and life styles are not vaccinations".

 Be prepared to leave your middle class fortresses; and to make common and humble cause with those who have always known that  "too much and too little has happened, for too long".

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