For the Person Who Has Everything

For the Person Who Has Everything

The letter you long to receive,
you will never find it in your
box. The email will not appear.

There is praise you will not hear
from your mother or father or
boss. What you continue to leave

room for, hoping it will materialize:
stop. The doctor’s verdict, however many
months or years curled up inside you,

sleeping. The idea you hatched, grew,
fed, caged. The job you sought at twenty
because you said you would. First Prize,

and the Nobel Prize, and Most Likely
to Succeed, and Honorable Mention.
Every trophy has been demolished,

erased. No sparkling, perfectly polished
car. No spotless kitchen as purest expression
of your soul. No person you’ve rightly

waited for your entire life, who excels
at the things you hate most, who wants
to do them for you, and needs you to help

them by effortlessly being your self,
no growth. Your imagined nonchalance
at learning someone is doing so well.