All the depictions I have viewed
of people picking cotton
were black people
mostly antebellum slaves
and not one poor white farmer
trying to break past poverty
turning one section
from wheat to the corse shrub.
In the movie Places in the Heart.
I remember Sally Field’s Edna
picking cotton along side
Danny Glover’s Moses Hadner
but not John Malkovich’s Mr. Will
who is blind and not a good shot
with a revolver.
My view of history is shaped
and colored with pigments
in old photographs, paintings
and moving pictures
thus Hollywood
has a bit more influence
than the docents
who interpret the past
at the historic places
I visit on my travels.
copyright © 2022 Kenneth P. Gurney
Umflop 