The Dark Side of White Privilege
Dad, born into white-hot poverty
eldest son of an adulterous drunk
abandoned
man of the house at five
white privilege.
His stepfather, also a booze bunny and bigot to boot...
To escape, he went to vocational school
as all the poor waifs did back in the day.
white privilege....
Married too young, a couple of sons...
was promised a job out west,
By all of people, the adulterous drunk...
3000 dreamy miles later.
With two small boys swirling in the prospectors' pan
but all the gold had vanished by then
white privilege.
He managed to make ends almost meet
with shovels for hands, soul of concrete.
white privilege
We survived in a one-bedroom, converted chicken coop.
At the age of twenty-two, he was crowned the king of desperation
Supported all of us without any complaint, including the deadbeat, my Uncle Frank.
White privilege.
Divorced, he lost custody of his doves.
Months beyond broke, he staggered back home.
Into the embrace of, you guessed it, the same drunken bigot.
White privilege.
Deadly happenstance brought us all back together again.
For forty years he wore the burning wreath
of back-breaking gigs on cinderblock dreams.
2 steps forward, 2 and a half back
One foot in the grave, the other on a snot rag
His ledger, never in the black.
White privilege,
Four decades, he earned the right
to hang up the shovel and pan.
The concrete settling into the joints
of his bent turtle hands.
Willing us away from poverty's fangs.
White privilege.
Soon after he retired. Mr. C arrived.
For three long years he battled and survived.
With Veins still flooded with benzene rings.
He had a blind date with open-heart surgery.
White privilege.
Old battleaxe versus scythe, he fought off the reaper.
Only to bury his mom, whom he loved very deeply.
The next to go was his beloved son.
White privilege.
He's not quite out of that shadow.
But I think he'll make it back to reclaim that glow.
I'm honored to have known such a bright angel soul.
My Privilege.
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