Just came across this; it's in the introduction to the autobiography Halfbreed, by Maria Campbell:

I am not bitter. I have passed that stage. I only want to say: this is what it is like; this is what it is still like. I know that poverty is not ours alone. Your people have it too, but in those earlier days you at least had dreams, you had a tomorrow. My parents and I never shared any aspirations for the future.


Note she says, "in the early days" ... In her adult life, she saw the poor white people who had lived around her starting to slide into hopelessness. (She would be in her seventies now, I think).

Another good book about growing up in poverty is All Over But the Shoutin' by Rick Bragg. Much insight into how poverty affects outlook and behaviour.