{"id":159,"date":"2021-05-23T17:29:13","date_gmt":"2021-05-23T17:29:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/john-shirley.com\/blog\/?p=159"},"modified":"2021-05-23T17:42:01","modified_gmt":"2021-05-23T17:42:01","slug":"bent-to-the-earth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/john-shirley.com\/blog\/bent-to-the-earth\/","title":{"rendered":"“BENT TO THE EARTH”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
I got this poem through the Poetry Foundation email list; a list which I recommend. As the poem was powerfully written and moving and trenchant, here it is. It’s by Blas Manuel De Luna.<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Bent to the Earth<\/a> By Blas Manuel De Luna<\/th><\/a> <\/a> <\/a><\/th><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
They had hit Ruben
with the high beams, had blinded
him so that the van
he was driving, full of Mexicans
going to pick tomatoes,
would have to stop. Ruben spun

the van into an irrigation ditch,
spun the five-year-old me awake
to immigration officers,
their batons already out,
already looking for the soft spots on the body,
to my mother being handcuffed
and dragged to a van, to my father
trying to show them our green cards.

They let us go. But Alvaro
was going back.
So was his brother Fernando.
So was their sister Sonia. Their mother
did not escape,
and so was going back. Their father
was somewhere in the field,
and was free. There were no great truths

revealed to me then. No wisdom
given to me by anyone. I was a child
who had seen what a piece of polished wood
could do to a face, who had seen his father
about to lose the one he loved, who had lost
some friends who would never return,
who, later that morning, bent
to the earth and went to work.<\/th><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I got this poem through the Poetry Foundation email list; a list which I recommend. As the poem was powerfully written and moving and trenchant, here it is. It’s by Blas Manuel De Luna. Bent to the Earth By Blas Manuel De Luna They had hit Rubenwith the high beams, had blindedhim so that the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n"BENT TO THE EARTH" - John Shirley Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/john-shirley.com\/blog\/bent-to-the-earth\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\""BENT TO THE EARTH" - John Shirley Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I got this poem through the Poetry Foundation email list; a list which I recommend. 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