Helen Keller once wrote that, “The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched—they must be felt with the heart.” How very true that is. And yet there are some material things we seem to be able to imbue with heart over the course of their existence. I think of a book with pages smudged and crinkled by innumerable readings; a favored stuffie or blanket worn bare from cuddling during the first years of a child’s life; a car that’s seen its owner through numerous adventures.

And I think of kitchen tables: my mom’s, my grandma’s, my Great Aunt Eula’s, and now my own—a piece of furniture that has been there with our household throughout most of our children’s lives, absorbing the joys we have celebrated, the blessings we have said, the arguments we have launched, the struggles we have shared, and the bounty of love we have for each other. It is the place where our days—and yes, perhaps our world—begin and end.

Blessed be the kitchen table.

Perhaps the World Ends Here

by Joy Harjo

The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.

The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.

We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it.

It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.

At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.

Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.

This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.

Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.

We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

From Harjo’s collection, The Woman Who Fell from the Sky (W.W. Norton, 1994)