The need to be carried has been used to naturalize gendered divisions of labor throughout Western culture. False histories of early human life are everywhere, spread across high-school classrooms, university departments, bestseller lists, even the familiar shorthand of “caveman” behavior in cartoons and movies. Like a nebulous fog that obscures the road ahead, these impressions merge to create a hazy wall of so-called logic, disguising hard-edged exploitation: back then, someone needed to carry the baby, and it makes sense that it would have been the body that was also in charge of feeding the baby. And if the person’s hands were busy carrying, then naturally, those that weren’t busy in such a way should have been contributing to the well-being of the group in other ways, like through hunting, protecting, discovering, inventing, adventuring, ruling. This all sounds reasonable, practically magnanimous, even communal—from each according to their ability, et cetera.
This rearrangement, or rearticulation, has implications for storytelling at large.
It is 7.30am. The sky is a pink-and-gold blur, and the breeze is invigorating. It’s a perfect day to walk from my London home to the source of the River Thames. I’m travelling light – phone, sandwich, water bottle – so I need nothing but a pair of capacious pockets. I have been walking the 185-mile Thames Path National Trail, with my friend Rhiannon, for more than four years. We do it bit by bit, a section at a time. No need to carry a heavy backpack. No need to book a hotel or pitch a tent. No need to use up weeks of precious holiday. No need to fret about whether we may fall out, or whether one of us will prove more ruggedly resilient than the other; nor any of the myriad factors that must be considered when planning a long-distance hike with a companion. And yes, we’re always back in time for a night in our own beds.
Sometimes reading poetry can feel exhilarating, like you are finally seeing and being seen. Other times it’s a slog that leaves you desperate for a nap to process what you just read. Patrycja Humienik’s debut poetry collection, “We Contain Landscapes,” is a healthy mix of both.
The magic trick of “Perfection,” like “Things” before it, is to reveal readers to themselves—gently, in the way a therapist might encourage a patient to arrive at an unflattering truth. This original misapprehension might not be your fault, but it is your responsibility, Latronico suggests. You, contemporary reader, are the victim of poor training. You have been duped into turning any text into a catalogue of fleeting images. You have been distracted from what is right there on the page, waiting to make you actually happy.