Anti Wage-Slavery, Pro-Freedom Quotations Of The Week 704-707

The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, which has been polling over 1,000 adults every day since January 2008, shows that Americans now feel worse about their jobs — and work environments — than ever before. People of all ages, and across income levels, are unhappy with their supervisors, apathetic about their organizations and detached from what they do. And there’s no reason to think things will soon improve.
…
In fact, workers often expressed frustration, disdain or disgust.
Do Happier People Work Harder?
By TERESA AMABILE and STEVEN KRAMER
New York Times
Published: September 3, 2011


…briefcases and pinstripes, umbrellas and raincoats, and the musty scent of damp business wear. The silent faces are not animated by anticipation. Rather they seem steeled in preparation. Today each rider seems to be looking far away, or perhaps deep inside, preparing for a return to toil.
…
“I don’t want to go to school,” the girl cries.

“Believe me, I understand,” Mom says. “Grown-ups don’t always like going to work either, but we have to.”

“Why?”

“We just do,” Mom says. “Here, want some M&M’s?”
Summer’s Over; the Game Begins
By SETH SCHIESEL
New York Times
Published: September 7, 2011



Demographic

By
Dorianne Laux

It's time for me to walk to the bus stop
And sit down among them, the man
Tied into his wheelchair, the woman
With the humped back, time for me
To kneel and hold his cup while he adjusts
His books and his pack, look up at her,
Flowered blouse. His scratched glasses.
There's a sky full of rain that won't
Come down, pigeons asleep on the lawn,
And across the street pumpkins piled high
In front of the market, Xeroxed flyers
Stapled to the telephone pole. To the east
A day moon above the bridge, cars
Filing under like a school of fish,
And if I look down at my feet I won't
Knock over the plastic dish the blind man
Has filled to the brim for his dog. It's time
To go to work, to wait while they gather
Their belongings, while the metal mesh
Platform unhinges and bangs down,
Time to nod to the driver as he pulls
Back on the lever and a man lifts
Into the air, to cup her elbows, a thin wing
Sharpened by suffering, to enter
The threshold and stand among them,
Listen to their murmurs, the news
Of the day, to slip my hand through
The frayed canvas noose and hold on.

The Best American Poetry 2006

A free race cannot be born of slave mothers.
Margaret Sanger