A poem in response to Dorothy Allison's essay: A Question of Class.
For Dorothy.
Courage, humor and love
Courage, humor and love
Simply disappear
In the politics of They.
Despair must be lived
In a world that despises the weak.
They who hold dominion
Overcome and deny.
The impulse to forget/remember
Those who disappear into:
One pair of eyes
One set of hands
--Heard by no one.
Our tears form the ground notes
In a howling cadence of
What will not change
In the world of We.
Courage soul: learn to wield.
© Karen Joyce 2019