You won't find it so hot

National Poetry Month is gone for this first year of pandemic, but it’s Friday, and May Day, when we turn to thoughts of the working class and revolution. This—despite all efforts of Cadet Bonespurs and his kleptocratic administration—is the United States of America, so there is no military hardware parade.

I’m feeling kind of Woodie Guthrie, and specifically his anthem for the migrants of the 1930s, who tried to find a better life outside the Dust bowl. This influx to California and the rough welcome they were given was documented in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, but no one reads that any more. However, in my childhood and youth, you could still hear that flat midwestern accent around Bakersfield and Fresno. And I recall sharply my mother dismissing those migrants as “Okies”.

Sadly, Guthrie’s point is still valid—if you don’t have the dough-re-mi, just keep on movin’, son.

This version is by John Mellencamp.

For the love of God, people—get out to the polls and vote in November.