{"id":12404,"date":"2015-02-17T20:39:00","date_gmt":"2015-02-17T20:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/challengedetroit.org\/blog\/kennethandejeski\/?p=130"},"modified":"2015-02-17T20:39:00","modified_gmt":"2015-02-17T20:39:00","slug":"what-work-is-philip-levine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/what-work-is-philip-levine\/","title":{"rendered":"What Work Is- Philip Levine"},"content":{"rendered":"

In honor of the passing of native Detroiter and US Poet Laureate, Philip Levine-<\/h2>\n
\n

 <\/p>\n

[embedplusvideo height=”358″ width=”584″ editlink=”http:\/\/bit.ly\/17OnWip” standard=”http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/1fDt5d-gn74?fs=1&start=15&vq=hd720″ vars=”ytid=1fDt5d-gn74&width=584&height=358&start=15&stop=&rs=w&hd=1&autoplay=0&react=1&chapters=&notes=” id=”ep4028″ \/]<\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

We stand in the rain in a long line<\/div>\n
waiting at Ford Highland Park. For work.<\/div>\n
You know what work is\u2014if you\u2019re<\/div>\n
old enough to read this you know what<\/div>\n
work is, although you may not do it.<\/div>\n
Forget you. This is about waiting,<\/div>\n
shifting from one foot to another.<\/div>\n
Feeling the light rain falling like mist<\/div>\n
into your hair, blurring your vision<\/div>\n
until you think you see your own brother<\/div>\n
ahead of you, maybe ten places.<\/div>\n
You rub your glasses with your fingers,<\/div>\n
and of course it\u2019s someone else\u2019s brother,<\/div>\n
narrower across the shoulders than<\/div>\n
yours but with the same sad slouch, the grin<\/div>\n
that does not hide the stubbornness,<\/div>\n
the sad refusal to give in to<\/div>\n
rain, to the hours of wasted waiting,<\/div>\n
to the knowledge that somewhere ahead<\/div>\n
a man is waiting who will say, \u201cNo,<\/div>\n
we\u2019re not hiring today,\u201d for any<\/div>\n
reason he wants. You love your brother,<\/div>\n
now suddenly you can hardly stand<\/div>\n
the love flooding you for your brother,<\/div>\n
who\u2019s not beside you or behind or<\/div>\n
ahead because he\u2019s home trying to<\/div>\n
sleep off a miserable night shift<\/div>\n
at Cadillac so he can get up<\/div>\n
before noon to study his German.<\/div>\n
Works eight hours a night so he can sing<\/div>\n
Wagner, the opera you hate most,<\/div>\n
the worst music ever invented.<\/div>\n
How long has it been since you told him<\/div>\n
you loved him, held his wide shoulders,<\/div>\n
opened your eyes wide and said those words,<\/div>\n
and maybe kissed his cheek? You\u2019ve never<\/div>\n
done something so simple, so obvious,<\/div>\n
not because you\u2019re too young or too dumb,<\/div>\n
not because you\u2019re jealous or even mean<\/div>\n
or incapable of crying in<\/div>\n
the presence of another man, no,<\/div>\n
just because you don\u2019t know what work is.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In honor of the passing of native Detroiter and US Poet Laureate, Philip Levine-   [embedplusvideo height=”358″ width=”584″ editlink=”http:\/\/bit.ly\/17OnWip” standard=”http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/1fDt5d-gn74?fs=1&start=15&vq=hd720″ vars=”ytid=1fDt5d-gn74&width=584&height=358&start=15&stop=&rs=w&hd=1&autoplay=0&react=1&chapters=&notes=” id=”ep4028″ \/]   We stand in the rain in a long line waiting at Ford Highland Park. For work. You know what work is\u2014if you\u2019re old enough to read this you know what work […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":218,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12404","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12404","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/218"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12404"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12404\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12404"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12404"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/challengedetroit.builtrare.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12404"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}