Freedom from Want

~ after Carlos Bulosan and Norman Rockwell



Dust and heat, dirt roads. Fields where

     every farmworker you'd see was bent to the soil: 
 
           iceberg lettuce, garlic, beans, all picked by hand. In

Delano, grape workers led strikes at ten vineyards. For 

     each box packed, they demanded twenty-five cents more.

           Immigrant wages in the '20s— lower than other workers.

Divide and conquer, scapegoating, name-calling, beatings.

     Eggplant and curly kale, arugula and strawberries;

           in every smoothie and on the flesh of apples, in-

dentations of that past. Easter tables bedecked with tinted

     eggs, spring peas, asparagus, and ham; and at Thanksgiving,
 
           impeccable tablecloths for a showcase of plenty.

Deliver us from a world which makes invisible the human cost of labor,

     endorses the privilege of some by taking away the rights of others.