The book, ‘Citizen,’ begins with daily encounters, little moments, places where language reveals how racism determines how we interact.
Little
Sometimes it seemed to me I could not look at those silent little figures; that I must go north, to the grim coal fields, to the Rocky Mountain camps, where the labor fight is at least fought by grown men.
The idea of a pseudonym had been flitting around my brain for a long time, along with its cognate, disappearance. In the 1980s, I published some poems under a pen name in a literary magazine to see what it would feel like. It was fun. It was even a little thrilling.
The greatest wealth is to live content with little, for there is never want where the mind is satisfied.
Nothing can be more striking to one who is accustomed to the little inclosures called public parks in our American cities, than the spacious, open grounds of London. I doubt, in fact, whether any person fully comprehends their extent, from any of the ordinary descriptions of them, until he has seen them or tried to walk over them.
Fridges can be modified to nudge their internal thermostats up and down just a little in response to the main’s frequency in such a way that, without ever jeopardising the temperature of your butter, they tend to take power at times that help the grid.
True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.
I was excited by what my painter friends were doing, and they seemed to be interested in our poetry too, and that was a wonderful little, fizzy sort of world.
Some go on to trade schools or get further training for jobs they are interested in. Some go into the arts, some are craftsmen, some take a little time out to travel, and some start their own businesses. But our graduates find and work at what they want to do.
Mere goodness can achieve little against the power of nature.