Unemployment could top 10 percent
The United States lost 2.6 million jobs last year, the most in any single year since World War II. Manufacturing is at a 28-year low and even Obama’s economists say unemployment could top 10 percent before the recession ends. One in 10 homeowners is at risk of foreclosure and the dollar continues its slide in value. On Friday, 1st Centennial Bank of Redlands, California, became the third U.S. bank to fail this year. Story here.
Well, there is a lot that could be said about this. This work in progress. This developing story. This disaster. There is more that should be said (despite the fact that a great deal has already been said). But for now, it seems best to step aside and pass the mic to Hank. Bukowski, the great poet laureate of the dispossessed, understood his subject matter, because he was his subject matter. But, like most artists whose work outlasts them, he also bore witness to a world outside of his living room. That he was able to articulate some of what he saw says a great deal about the man, and his art. That what he said (and, of course, what many others have said, about this subject) says a great deal about how far we have not come, and how low we may still be about to go. There are other artists who will attempt to grapple with the sordid side effects of this mess we’ve made. It is unfortunate that there won’t be any other Bukowskis. It is deplorable that the progress we’ve supposedly made since the middle of last century has not downsized the conditions that inspire this art in the first place.
Or, put another way, by another great poet:
It is difficult to get the news from poems yet men die miserably every day for lack of what is found there
– William Carlos Williams
