Loss - Kyle Luo

LOSS Something in me repeats in an obsessive beat that I may have lost something or left it behind in the café or the bookstore where I’d been I searched my possessions and no loss was found nor did I discover what had been lost but the loss kept asserting its existence through palpitations and minor fits Athenian sophists philosophized: “A thing you haven’t lost is necessarily in your possession you haven’t lost a tail—therefore, you have a tail or vice versa what you’ve lost was necessarily yours” but what have I lost? I must look for my loss in order to know what I’m looking for is it an object or a thing or the thing and was it mine before it was lost or is it that some inner authority is trying to bequeath me, like a Hellenistic sophist, something I had never possessed as for example a chance as if I ever stood a chance © Translation: 2013, Tsipi Keller First published on Poetry International, 2013 http://www.poetryinternationalweb.net/pi/site/poem/item/23784 To me, this poem was pretty universal in theme. The idea of loss is something that we all deal with no matter our social or economic status. What I found interesting about this poem was that its idea of loss wasn’t your generic, everyday idea of loss: it was a more complex and abstract idea. Keller states “I must look for my loss in order to know what I’m looking for,” which to me was a really deep idea. A lot of the loss that Keller writes about isn’t a physical loss (“I searched my possessions and no loss was found), but rather intangible. I initially chose the poem just because of the title which seemed really generic and simple to me, but I was pleased to find that it was far deeper.