The Stuff of Astounding: A Poem for Juneteenth By PATRICIA SMITHUnless you spring from a history that is smug and reckless, unlessyou’ve vowed yourself blind to a ceaseless light, you see us. Weare a shea-shined toddler writhing through Sunday sermon, we arethe grizzled elder gingerly unfolding his last body. We are the doctor onanother day at the edge of reason, coaxing a wrong hope, rippingopen a gasping body to find air. Only those feigning blindness fail to see the bodyof work we are, and the work of body we have done. Hear a whole people celebrate their free and fragile lives,then find your own place inside that song.

Source: New York Times June 18, 2020 22:46 UTC