The Other Side Of Poverty. Just like a coin has two sides to it…
Tags: Illumination, Literature, Book Review, Fiction Writing

Acts of Kindness in Maria Pacheco’s “Poverty”

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Just like a coin has two sides to it, so does poverty, according to Maria Pacheco’s “Poverty,” which seems to suggest a deep flaw in our age-long perception of poverty as menace to society. Poverty puts our happiness and desire to live long and enjoy a good life in jeopardy. However, while poverty is a great social ill, it does give rise to acts of kindness. Specifically, Pacheco uses fruit imagery to express the idea that kindness is the primary way to overcome poverty.

Maria’s story quickly engages its reader’s attention from the very first paragraph with a main character whose name is Poverty. This presents the reader with a strong motivation to read on. The short text presents Poverty’s request with a compelling vegetative imagery of limbs of the huaya tree, which represent its stems and branches. There is an awesome personification of death in the piece as one who believes he is the custodian of all powers, and can make demands on others at any time of his choosing. He soon realises to his big surprise that his power to take life away could depart from him. Death becomes human, and experiences what it feels like to be in a helpless situation. Death suffers poverty of power. The ephemeral reality of power plays out from time to time in our world. Recent accounts of history are full of brutal dictators who had absolute power, only for their power to depart and make them vulnerable.

It seems Poverty’s survival depends on how much fruits she can gather from her tree and sell. It seems her inability to gather fruits from the trees is the prime reason she experiences poverty. Anyone who loses his source of income in life is most likely to end up in poverty. It is therefore, not hard to understand frustration she seems to feel, coupled with the need she has to protect her source of income. This results in the type of favour she cannot help but ask of the old Man who could be pictured as God, the all-powerful who makes all things happen, making unexpected appearance at an unlikely place in form of the poor, the miserable and the desperate. Opportunity gets in touch with Poverty by putting her to test. She passes the test through her act of kindness in her time of distress. Poverty assumes a state of immortality. The story at this point also seems to say that poverty will still exist no matter how much wealth gets created in our world.

Maria Pacheco’s “Poverty” could benefit from making it longer by exploring the world of the Lord of Death. Who really is he? What is really the reason why he walks up to Poverty and asks for her life? Exploring possible reasons why this could happen might open up a world of more interesting and insightful themes for this story. Nothing is mentioned of how doctors actually got to know about Poverty’s particular state of immortality. Did someone who knew her tell the doctors?

The length and breadth of Maria’s story point to one central message and informative conclusion that acts of kindness bear good fruits that last a very long time, if not forever.

WORK CITED

Pacheco, Maria. “Poverty.” Words of the True Peoples: Anthology of Contemporary Mexican Indigenous-Language Writers. Volume one: Prose. Ed. Carlos Montemayor, and Donald Frischmann. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2005. Print.