Poverty is defined as the state of being extremely poor or the state of being inferior in quality or insufficient in amount. Living in Newark has highlighted the many struggles that an average person under the poverty line lives. When the word poverty pops into the mind of a normal teenager, images such as poor, homeless, and uneducated beings are thought to have some resemblance. Unfortunately this is not always the case. In the famous letter entitled, “What is Poverty?” written by the mysterious Joe Goodwin Parker in 1971 she describes her life and how difficult it was to live barely making enough money to provide for her children. In her words she states, “Poverty is staying up all night in the cold nights to watch the fire, knowing one spark on the newspaper covering the walls means your sleeping children will die in flames.” (Parker). Reading this article changed my perspective on poverty completely. Through my personal in depth analysis of the letter written by the mysterious Joe Goodwin…show more content… In my mind, I believed that it was usually a temporary issue. If someone worked hard and stretched the dollar, he or she would escape poverty without any issues. However, Parker showed me that poverty is a recurrent issue and leaving is not easy. It latches onto a person and pulls them down whenever he or she gets a foot in the right direction. In the passage, Parker asks us to merely listen. Just listen to what she has to say and to retract any judgmental ideas that appear in my mind. (1). I would usually turn a blind eye when I saw a person who was struggling financially. Now, I begin to understand the true pain he feels and the sense of hopelessness that surges through his body every day. I realized that my bias has stopped me from seeing the true problems of the people in the slums and ghettos. For once, I was able to understand a poor person’s plight, rather than just stand idly
