We Are The Antifragile

“First it was a broken toe, then a broken brow, and finally a broken heart. But, as I said somewhere, the human heart is indestructible. You only imagine it is broken. What really takes a beating is the spirit. But the spirit too is strong and, if one wishes, can be revived.” – Henry Miller

We Are The Antifragile

We wandered in the blue night
to fight away the warming
acrid seas, we said.
To celebrate the Fragile.
To lift Peru to the list
of nations united,
straining to change
the climate
ourselves.

At first I did not notice
his missing forearm
the tiny, unfunctional
hand growing from his elbow.

Instinctively I lifted him to
my shoulders
like a son—but a stranger—
to better view the Fragile
images and blue light.

From that perch I heard
and felt his awe.
It matched mine as
mantas
nudibranchs
sea turtles
and water
projected
pulsed
reflected
into the eyes
of all who stood together.
We faced south.

His small fingers
searched and gripped
the edges of
my eye socket.
A useful handle
strongly held tight
as the severity
of our global predicament
played to the crowd.
We spread across the park
on the cliff
beside the Pacific.

Diego, will you come up
with me to the podium,
I asked.

He said he would, si.
He said he was scared, tengo miedo.
He stomach hurt.

I said I am too and
So does mine.
We’ll help each other. Amigos.
Vamanos, I said.

From the stage
We shared
a blue marble
a message
on outstretched
Fragile hands.
Backed by soldiers
with less to do
than when I last visited
terrorized Lima
a quarter century ago.

A small gift
a reminder to hold
something for your pocket
easily forgotten
then found
then passed along.
Or simply lost.

Now I am home
in bed
my eye infected
invaded
by the germ
on his small hand.

Pain, distraction, fear,
patience, healing sleeplessness.
A steady reminder of Fragile.
The film, the book, the boy, the nation, the planet.

We are the Antifragile.

["Antifragility is beyond resilience or robustness. The resilient resists shocks and stays the same; the antifragile gets better^. Simply, antifragility is defined as a convex response to a stressor or source of harm (for some range of variation), leading to a positive sensitivity to increase in volatility (or variability, stress, dispersion of outcomes, or uncertainty, what is grouped under the designation "disorder cluster"). - Nassim Nicholas Taleb]