This new minimalism’s getting me
down again. I’m of the old guard
that gets lusty at corner shelves
rich with china dogs and silverplate
spoons enameled with the sigils of states.
It’s not incorrect to think Goodwill
illustrates the leanest meaning of self.
Bulb-lit cubbies of dressing rooms
narrow the total focus to the body —
white dimpled arms skinned
in fey polyester, outturned feet
shod in clogs with soles thinning
to become nearer the earth,
half off. Blue-ticket Wednesdays
the chance to reap twice the lost
history — dustbinned legacy —
for the cost of a solitary path. I want
to reinstate the nobility of reuse,
every offcast object a lifeline
keening for continuation. To plumb
the crumbling pressboard bins
is the truest path to empathy: recognition
that selves can’t be cleaved
from environment, objects people
the selves, artifacts outlast us all,
recasting under each new hand
that claims them.  

Kate Garklavs
12 01 16