by Camilla Winterhager
Remember the girl who never wanted a son,
But now she has two from a man who’s a jerk.
And the young mom can’t afford to work,
Because all of her chores are never done.
In all the forms that they give her,
She’s no clue what goes where,
So there’s no money in her purse,
And from day to day it gets worse.
Remember the boy who couldn’t sit still in class,
Brought no A’s to a home that didn’t last,
Had to sleep in a cell more than one time,
For things you can’t call a crime.
Now he drinks every day to numb the pain
That most of his friends are dead or insane,
Has nowhere to go and nothing to do
When the bailiff comes for the bills overdue.
Remember the man who stopped bringing the mail
When his bones got tired, and his face got pale.
Now he’s too old to hire and too young to retire
He’s exactly what no one’s looking for.
He lives in a place on the edge of town
“The ghetto,” people say with a frown.
Every time it goes well, then he mentions his address
“I’m sorry, for you there’s no chance of success.”
Remember the man who came here just to live
But no one wanted what he had to give
Who didn’t respond to letters and calls
And no one looked behind his walls.
It had nothing to do with his skill or with his will
But the fog in his mind that kept him still.
Water and gas, they stopped all the supplies
And one day they found him in a swarm of flies.
Installation In Orbit by Tomás Saraceno at K21, March 2016. Photo © Winterhager