He’s in our house, looking over us
from the framed souvenir poster hanging above
the parlor fireplace: Marx Memorial Library.
I always make a little red construction-paper cap 
for him at Christmas, taping it to the glass,
and he becomes St. Marxiclaus, Jolly Saint Karl. 
Winter mornings, I can barely see him
in the blinding light and dust, but at night, 
his dark eyes watch me work at my desk: Zooming, 
grading, planning, marshalling the right words 
in the right order for a student who’s ready to give up. 
Even good friends who spot him might snark or smirk.
As if the forest across the street or the trees in their yards
aren’t dying. As if my old classmate Cindy doesn’t sleep,
when she sleeps at all, wrapped up with her grandkids
in a ball in the back of her car, as if my pals and I didn’t vote
for who might be the lesser genocidaire — and lose. 
Marx rests his head on one hand, writes with the other: 
A world to win and nothing to lose but our chains. 
The masses hold banners behind him, colorfully arrayed 
across history: each slogan, Down with Slavery, No Pasaran,
with somebody’s story behind it: running down a dirt road
staunching a wound, watching a husband take a final,
gargled breath. Each little face in the picture: millions
of somebodies. The other day, I took Marx down before 
a MAGA plumber came to the house. But as I went 
to open the door, I stopped and placed him 
back up on the wall.

Jonathan Andersen is an English teacher and poet from the US. The poster of the poem is a souvenir from The Radical Poets Tour in summer 2008, organised by Smokestack Books, the last stop of which was the Marx Memorial Library in London. 

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