To be of use

So many people do good things in the world, in their communities, for their fellow citizens. It is easy to forget this. It is easy to view the world through dark lenses. And it is particularly easy these days when hate seems the coin of the realm, when the “narrative,” as they say, is controlled by a person intent on doing evil in the world.

But just this morning I was reviewing the invitation list for Friday’s reading event at Oregon State Penitentiary. It’s an event I’ve been working to make happen for close to two years, a public reading for “my” writers, the men in the Lifers’ Writing Group I started more than four years ago. They are powerful writers with something to say. They are thoughtful, determined, hard-working, committed to their craft. And they are, most of them, in prison for life.

Because of two wonderful human beings at the prison, Steven Finster and Karuna Thompson, the event is finally finally happening this Friday. That’s why I’m reviewing the invitation list. And why, looking at the scores of people on that list, I feel compelled to write about Right Livelihood. About the community-building, socially conscious, soul-enriching choices these scores of people (and so many others) have made. The way they have chosen to spend their working lives. Their extraordinary commitment to volunteer efforts. Their in-it-for-the-long-haul work for social welfare and social justice.

These folks who will come on Friday to listen to the writers speak truth to power work to feed the hungry, house the homeless, care for the indigent, advocate for those behind bars, work for reform, teach, mentor. They “harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart” as this wonderful Marge Piercy poem puts it.

To be of use

The people I love best
Jump into work headfirst
Without dallying in the shallows
And swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight…

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
Who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
Who strain the mud and the muck to move things forward,
Who do what has to be done, again and again…

The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
Has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
But you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
And a person for work that is real.

May you jump headfirst. And keep jumping.