Marge Piercy
Bitter herbs
Out of slavery -- painful, yes, demeaning,
a narrow future of being worked to death --just
like Krupps and Farben at Auschwitz used
their slaves --but also accustomed. They
had grown up in Egypt and Egypt was what
they knew. To revolt takes a kind of reckless
courage, a willingness to leap into what could
you fear be worse. At least I'm alive
the slave thinks, maybe the overseer will
learn kindness tomorrow. Blood on the lintels
marked those who would rise up and go --
into hunger, the wilderness, wandering,
the vast sandstorm of the unknown.
Now of course we have no slaves. Only
millions upon millions sold into sexual
bondage, into chattel slavery to pay
debts their parents cannot meet except
by selling a daughter, a son. Out of poverty
into worse. When at our seder table we
are bidden eat the bitter herbs to remember
slavery, feel how many millions now
are bound. Whoever cannot control her
body, whoever cannot own his labor
is caught in a narrow place from which
only death can open its black door.
Bent over machines in stiffling dim
factories, lying on stained mattresses,
beaten as they bend over fields to plant
and pluck, when will we helpfree them,
my people, when will we welcome them
to a table set with plenty?
Marge Piercy
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