Monday, November 20\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t know
\nif it\u2019s better to be good at a bad job or bad at a good job\u201d<\/p>\n
What\u2019s sweet about Thanksgiving, at least one of the sweet things, is a 3 day work week followed by a 4 day weekend. \u00a0It\u2019s a reminder that an ordinary 5 day week teaches people to be strong, develop staying power, especially when one 5 day adds onto another, something to be proud of, our work rhythms. \u00a0Interrupting them now and then, like this week, puts a light on their ordinary strength and beauty.<\/p>\n
I hadn\u2019t posted a poem from Detroit poet Jamaal May in a while. \u00a0He writes \u201cShift\u201d with the same subtle density of language that characterizes his poetry. \u00a0 \u201cShift\u201d asks a reader to read two or three times to find a way into a world of growing up into an adult\u2019s awareness while learning the honor of showing up and doing a job. \u00a0 It\u2019s worth the 2nd and 3rd read, better out loud with pauses.<\/p>\n
Have a blest week.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
john sj<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Acting on an anonymous tip, a shift supervisor<\/p>\n
at a runaway shelter strip-searched six teenagers.<\/p>\n
Mrs. Haver was taping shut the mouths<\/p>\n
of talkative students by the time she neared retirement,<\/p>\n
and Mr. Vickers, a skilled electrician in his day,<\/p>\n
didn\u2019t adapt when fuses became circuit breakers,<\/p>\n
a fact that didn\u2019t stop him from tinkering<\/p>\n
in our basement until the house was consumed by flame.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I used to want to be this bad at a job.<\/p>\n
I wanted to show up pissy drunk to staff meetings<\/p>\n
when the power point slides were already dissolving<\/p>\n
one into another, but I had this bad habit<\/p>\n
of showing up on time<\/p>\n
and more sober than any man should be<\/p>\n
when working audio\/visual hospitality<\/p>\n
in a three star hotel that was a four star hotel<\/p>\n
before he started working there.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
When the entire North Atlantic blacked out,<\/p>\n
every soul in the Hyatt Regency Dearborn flooded<\/p>\n
the parking lot panicked about terrorists and rapture,<\/p>\n
while I plugged in microphones and taped down cables<\/p>\n
by flashlight\u2014you know, in case whatever cataclysm<\/p>\n
unfolded didn\u2019t preempt the meetings. Meetings,<\/p>\n
before which I\u2019d convince a children\u2019s hospital<\/p>\n
to pay fifteen dollars to rent a nine dollar laser pointer.<\/p>\n
Thirty-five bucks for a flip chart,<\/p>\n
extra paper on the house. Is it good to be good at a job<\/p>\n
if that job involves pretending to be a secret service agent<\/p>\n
for Phizer\u2019s George Bush impersonator? I don\u2019t know<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
if it\u2019s better to be good at a bad job or bad at a good job,<\/p>\n
but there must be some kind of satisfaction<\/p>\n
in doing a job so poorly, you\u2019re never asked to do it again.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not saying he\u2019s a hero, but there\u2019s a guy out there<\/p>\n
who overloaded a transformer and made a difference,<\/p>\n
because in a moment, sweating through my suit,<\/p>\n
groping in the dark when my boss was already home,<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I learned that I\u2019d work any job this hard, ache<\/p>\n
like this to know that I could always ache for something.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a hell for people like me where we shovel<\/p>\n
the coal we have mined ourselves into furnaces<\/p>\n
that burn the flesh from our bones nightly,<\/p>\n
and we never miss a shift.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
BY\u00a0<\/span>JAMAAL MAY<\/a><\/p>\n http:\/\/www.jamaalmay.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Monday, November 20\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t know if it\u2019s better to be good at a bad job or bad at a good job\u201d What\u2019s sweet about Thanksgiving, at least one of the sweet things, is a 3 day work week followed … Continue reading ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/170\/2017\/11\/JamaalMay.jpg\")
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