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Monday, September 19, 2022

IMMIGRANTS ARE TAKING OUR JOBS

by Robert Wildwood

When Lever Alejos of Venezuela arrived at the southern border penniless in July, he gladly accepted a free bus ride to Washington, D.C., courtesy of the state of Texas. He had no family or friends to receive him, and spent one night in the plaza across from Union Station. He soon settled into a homeless shelter. “I have nothing,” Mr. Alejos, 29, said on his third day in the city, “but I have the will to work and succeed.” Two months later, Mr. Alejos is making between $600 to $700 a week, saving up to buy a used car and planning to move out of the shelter. “There is so much opportunity here,” he said on Thursday, at the end of a day’s work. “You just have to take advantage of it.” —The New York Times, September 18, 2022


“Immigrants are taking our jobs”

after he said that to me

I wondered how it could be true

that a person with little capital and

only the possessions they carried

was so powerful that

they could “Take” a job from someone.

   Everytime I ever got a job

I had to ask for it

and a job was offered to me.

   Talk about the capitalists who

are giving jobs away to

desperate people willing to accept lower pay

Inside our country or worldwide.

   Talk about the capitalists who

turned their back on you and your family

to exploit a vulnerable working class population

the immigrants.

   Follow the money and see 

who is the real thief



Robert Wildwood, a poet from Duluth, Minnesota, makes his living as a nurse.