Wanting

 2/28/2026 (c) 

This was a class assignment, to write a poem using mostly plagiarized lines from other books. I ended up sourcing from 7 books and adding only the refrain as different takes on a line from Lacan. 

Consider this fact: just about every human has the fantasy

that he or she would make a good friend to a wild animal.

That a child was once kept twenty-two years in its mother’s womb

 by means of witches, and when born it had hair, beard, and teeth.

It’s said that after arriving in a new place,

we will have replaced the entirety of the water in our bodies

with that of the local watershed in just a few days.

(In everything, I am left wanting.)

 

When asked to count their heartbeat for a short time,

 one in four people are off by about 50 percent.

The body is the home we never leave.

We have lost the context for our longing.

We are disconnected from nature but anaesthetized

to the enormity of that loss. Our overemphasis on rationalism

has sent the feeling life into atrophy.

(I never let them see me wanting.)

 

Economic insecurity is the greatest thought inhibitor of all.

Class war is the critical battle of our time.

Foundations, Think Tanks, and the university—

 

the torture chamber buzz of anxiety that afflicts students today

(I am tired of wanting.)

 

In every settled community, the ploughshare

is of greater value, though less glory is attached to it

than the sword or any other weapon.

Reject making a virtue out of taste and consumption habits.

Be heretics. We should blaspheme.

(wanting is engineered)

 

Eschew not only capitalism but also colonialism and imperialism.

(In everything, I am trained to want.)