I love the people who live in my building.
It’s a tall building with lifts. It’s better that way, no one
has to carry anyone on their backs. What I mean is they
could also walk up on their own two feet, but that would be the case only if
in my building there weren’t people in need of favours. But there are,
and afterwards they turn their backs on repaying the climb – I heard
there are people in the building who have forests from Normandy at home (I
only have weeds!). And the building’s lifts break down constantly.
They break down and then the people on the upper floors
need carriers. The people on lower floors
have started to be born with broader shoulders
so their carrying improves, and now the lifts
are almost always broken. I’m lucky because they know
I only keep weeds at home. They never ask me
to carry anything nor do they park new trees
to bar my doorway; they are all scared of being contaminated.
Nowadays, the people on the upper floors beg favours
of me: could I possibly move house, building, they would even
give me a house with a Normandy forest inside.
But I don’t want to. I like it here. My weeds
now reach the first floor. Sometimes I climb up them
and am invited to dinner. We talk and laugh and when
we stop the silence around us grows.
Until now my weeds have stayed fresh, they climb on their own.