Wednesday, November 23, 2022

Honoring

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, and in remembrance of what has come before...

Who sings to the plants
That are grown for our plates?
Are they gathered lovingly
In aprons or arms?
Or do they suffer the fate
Of the motor-driven whip
Of the monster reaper?
No song at all, only
The sound of money
Being stacked in a bank
Who stitched the seams in my clothes
One line after another?
Was the room sweaty and dark
With no hour to spare?
Did she have enough to eat?
Did she have a home anywhere?
Or did she live on the floor?
And where were the children?
Or was the seamstress the child
With no home of his or her own?
Who sacrifices to make clothes
For strangers of another country?
And why?
Let's remember to thank the grower of food
The picker, the driver,
The sun and the rain.
Let's remember to thank each maker of stitch
And layer of pattern,
The dyer of color
In the immense house of beauty and pain.

*     *    *

Let's honor the maker.
Let's honor what's made.

Joy Harjo, America's Poet Laureate, Honoring, An American Sunrise

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