May Day, May Day, May Day!

"Yeah, this one's for the workers who toil night and day

By hand and by brain to earn your pay

Who for centuries long past for no more than your bread

Have bled for your countries and counted your dead

In the factories and mills, in the shipyards and mines

We've often been told to keep up with the times

For our skills are not needed, they've streamlined the job

And with sliderule and stopwatch our pride they have robbed

We're the first ones to starve, we're the first ones to die

The first ones in line for that pie in the sky

And we're always the last when the cream is shared out

For the worker is working when the fat cat's about

And when the sky darkens and the prospect is war

Who's given a gun and then pushed to the fore

And expected to die for the land of our birth

Though we've never owned one lousy handful of earth?

We're the first ones to starve, we're the first ones to die

The first ones in line for that pie in the sky

And we're always the last when the cream is shared out

For the worker is working when the fat cat's about

And all of these things the worker has done

From tilling the fields to carrying the gun

We've been yoked to the plough since time first began

And always expected to carry the can"

The Workers Song-By the DropKick Murphy's

"And all of these things the worker has done
From tilling the fields to carrying the gun
We've been yoked to the plough since time first began
And always expected to carry the can" 

The Workers Song-By the Dropkick Murphy's

The Dropkick Murphy's

The lovely Camassia cusickii I started from seeds collected in the Wallowa Mountains about 16 years ago. Looks wonderful with the late blooming tulips.

What is May Day to you? A celebration of spring, dancing around the May Pole? The Celebration of Beltane? The somber recognition of a long and hard fight to be allowed to only work 8 hours a day? 

This ones for the workers! If ever there were a time in history when the lowest on the totem pole should be recognized for holding the whole thing up its right now. My heartfelt gratitude to the farm workers and laborers who are risking covid to get food to our table, many of them undocumented immigrants that the current administration views as trash not worthy of help in this time of need. Here is to the minimum wage worker at the grocery store risking infection so you can eat. Here is to the essential workers who kept us alive and healthy, and are making minimum wage and probably struggling to pay the rent themsleves. 

Happy International Workers Day.

Mark