"There's no life without furniture."
Joseph Brodsky
She scouted the resale shop, picked up embroidered tablecloths,
silverware needing a shine, caved leather boots,
a white linen outfit crisp in the Bay Area heat. In the back, a lady
who had tied her ponytail with a plastic flower, stacked National Geographics
rescued from bathrooms and T.V. caddies. Then there was the chair.
Feet that could hitch a ride sticking out over the curb of a street corner.
All curves. She fell into its green silk upholstery and leaned her head
against its flank. One hundred dollars divided into four payments.
Once she loaded the chair into the trunk of the Toyota,
the ponytail lady raised a hand to her throat and watched it go.
She stationed the chair on the parquet next to the heater, but out of range.
No toasting in the dining room allowed.
Cared for the chair the way she did her family, dusted its wood,
turned over its seat cushion, ran her finger around the chartreuse
piping like a runway for fingerprints.
She felt rich, the way her body came together in one piece,
arms on wings, head pressed against its fluted back.
In the lap of others especially on evenings
when her husband remained in his bedroom, the chair
held her close, a friend willing to be more if she needed.
Not things, although she continued to go to the resale shop,
a rotary egg beater, the kind her mother used, a pewter bread tray
crusted on the levee of other hands,
objects with their own pyramid of touch,
a safety net for disparate thoughts
from a day of check-off lists,
to a night of silence and closed doors.
