The working theory is this:
If we rage at something
we are not, we become
what we fling ourselves
against, protecting our bodies
from the blunt force
of socioeconomics,
and the active threat
of a tenuous future. I am
here today in an Airbnb,
safe only through the grace
of a fortunate marriage,
no house, no vehicle
to my name, in my name,
everything held in a cloud,
someone else’s server,
even this poem a reminder
we come to the world
with nothing, and we leave it
just the same. And I’d like
to think it is freeing to own
only what I’ve collected:
too many shoes and purses,
knickknacks, figurines, blazers
I will probably never wear,
shoes my children kicked off
as babies, secondhand dresses
with prints and ruffles. But even
they are stored elsewhere,
others holding them in accounts
I can never pay for, will never
get to pay for. And if you think I
have chosen this, have taken
a vow of poverty, you will have
thought better of me than I do
of myself, unhappy I judge so
harshly my parts that do not
succeed in systems—
the very threats I condemn,
because I knew what it meant
to have scarcity in my past,
and I feel it encroaching now,
in the face of my assertions:
No one should have to borrow
everything in order to survive,
and worth cannot be calculated
in dollars. I do not believe we are
empty. Everyone is their own
home. Everyone does deserve one.
Everyone is owed their name.
Katherine Mercurio Gotthardt, copyright May 23, 2024, all right reserved
Posted in Katherine's Coffeehouse
