Brain Food #738
Perhaps the World Ends Here
Thoughts of the day
Today, a short poem that acts as an ode to the kitchen table, the place that we always find ourselves drawn to, perhaps more than any other piece of furniture in the house. The poem explores how much of life tends to happen in the kitchen, a domestic space that is reserved for much more than just cooking and eating.
The kitchen table brings families and loved ones together, to embrace rituals and milestones, but also to face difficulties. In the closing scene of Don’t Look Up, the world literally ends while the characters sit around the kitchen table, enjoying a final meal with each other.
Much of life takes place in the simplest of moments, and in the most basic of rooms. And, circling back to yesterday’s message of gratitude, if you have a kitchen table to sit around, and people to join you, even if the world is falling apart around you, you might already have many of the ingredients of a full life.
Perhaps the World Ends Here
by Joy Harjo
The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.
The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.
We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it.
It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.
At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.
Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.
This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.
Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.
We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.
At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.
Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.
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