Vox Populi
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Barbara Crooker: Who Do You Carry?
Still here I carry my old delicious burdens.
Walt Whitman, “Song of the Open Road”
.
For years, I carried my mother, though
she grew lighter and lighter, letting go
of her possessions with every move,
until, at the end, there were only her clothes,
left to be bagged for Goodwill. Untethered
by her oxygen tank, she floated away—
Today I carry my son, whose body’s an adult,
but whose mind is a small child’s.
My burden—his future when I am gone—
is heavy, the social safety net ripped,
holes big enough to sail a boat through.
On city streets, the homeless unfurl
their sleeping bags like hungry tongues.
The “lucky ones” have tents in a vacant lot.
How have we come to this, Walt Whitman?
It’s the Twenty-First century, in America.
Can you still hear us singing?
From Slow Wreckage by Barbara Crooker (Grayson, 2024). Included in Vox Populi by permission of the author.
Barbara Crooker is the author of twelve chapbooks and ten full-length books of poetry. Her many awards include the WB Yeats Society of New York Award, the Thomas Merton Poetry of the Sacred Award, and three Pennsylvania Council fellowships in literature.
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What a beautiful poem. So much truth, and heart.
It makes me think of my brother and his grown autistic son. How he worries what will happen to him when he and his wife are gone. Ah, but my nephew has a brother and two sisters and aunts and uncles who love him! ❤️
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Thanks, Lisa. We need to carry each other.
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Oh, Barbara, I can only imagine. I have not been able to show my mohter my love at the end, I was far away. I am also far away from my children and grandchildren. Your poem left me heartbroken.
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I am heartbroken on your behalf. Thank you for the kind words.
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I am deeply touched by your poem Barbara, singing as it does of your son, your fears for his future, of this torn social safety net. How indeed have we come to this? thank you
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I am deeply touched by your poem Barbara, how it sings of your son, of your fears for his future, of the torn social safety net. How indeed have we come to this? thank you
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And thank you, Jan. Our writers need to hear from readers…
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What a most moving, poignant, important poem of love, humanity, restraint, and motherhood, dear Barbara. How true it is, that such love and burden never ends…Poems such as this should be sent to all politicians, no matter their affiliation.
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Especially the ones who use Project 2025 as their playbook, right?
Thanks for the kind words, Laure-Anne–
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As I awake, again anxious, I think of my young grandson, what I haven’t done, what I now can’t, wonder about giving up, wonder why I can’t just fix things.
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We can’t give up, we have to vote, we have to keep on keeping on. . . .
Thanks for the kind words!
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Thanks Barbara and Vox Populi for this powerful poem. It shows me how important words are in the face of terror, grief, and anxiety. Not all great poems are about daffodils. We all have a Guernica in our hearts, but for most of us we need a Barbara Crooker to express it well. When I was at the George Floyd memorial a couple of weeks after his murder, a crowd of us looked at all the signs, people mostly quiet. Then the woman next to me, a stranger, said her poem: “a million wilted flowers.” And then I wept,
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Powerful, Jim. Thank you!
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Oh, what a powerful poem when words become almost healing in their honest pain.
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The word “almost” is very powerful in your sentence, Mandy.
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Thanks for the kind words. “Almost” is right–we have to keep working, keep struggling to get to healing. . . .
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A truly great poem. Profound in its humane vision of compassion and responsibility. Thank you, Barbara.
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Well, thank YOU for giving it another outing. . . .
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it’s a fine and truthful poem Barbara, that wears its weight well. I must add from my “list,” workday weight I can barely or even no longer lift, and the burden of what I ought to have said, and what I ought never to have said, as this world changes so formidably around us.
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Thanks so much, Sean!
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“Today I carry my son, whose body’s an adult,
but whose mind is a small child’s.
My burden—his future when I am gone—“
as a parent, I also see the shocking imbalance of wealth and lack of care for all and it is the most unsettling thing for me too, Barbara, you speak for me as well, thank you
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Thanks, Helen. Those of us with seriously disabled children have to worry about taking care of them even after we’re dead. . . . . It never ends–
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hugs of strong support for you, Barbara xx
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