Jellyfish sting no matter your color
Poem (audio)
Jellyfish sting no matter your color.
They’re just being jellyfish.
Stinging is in their nature—
but they mean no harm.
Their sting is actually incidental.
Jellyfish stung folks to a hard sore
mid 1900s on the bifurcated beach
of Buckroe and Bay Shore
during Segregation… that was so harmful
and sad to say— intentional.
Jellyfish know nothing about Segregation.
They don’t have a brain for that.
People do, however,
especially back in the ol’ day
during the time when …
Whites went to the left to Buckroe.
Blacks busted to the right to Bay Shore.
All the while, jellyfish just swam the bay.
Commentary:
This recent poem was inspired by a quote taken from a recent news report commemorating of the first designated “Green Book location marker”, at the former site of Bay Shore (Beach Hotel), in the city of Hampton, Virginia.
Thankfully, there is no racially bifurcated beach.
Did you Know? Using some fancy new scientific tools, jellyfish encountering is being forecasted. Testing on jellyfish, or “sea nettles”, is being done, initially in the Chesapeake Bay, off the Virginia waters. Probabilities of encountering them are based on shifting environmental conditions – such as salt concentration and water temperature at the bay.
Fascinating. They sting and they hurt! Amazing creatures.
Very interesting factoid, thanks for this: This recent poem was inspired by a quote taken from a recent news report commemorating of the first designated “Green Book location marker”, at the former site of Bay Shore (Beach Hotel), in the city of Hampton, Virginia.