Simone Weil 45

If you hide the universe from the universe, no one will take it from you. When his partner died 20 years ago, he posted a note and some photos on the door of the faculty lounge. When he came to campus in recent years, he brought his little dogs and carried a cane. One student called him a “young old man.” He loved Richard Goode's Beethoven. He had been a pianist. He had loved the ocean. He had become paranoid. This is not an elegy. Our chair writes that the dean informed her that he retired. If we wish to be in touch, we can find him at his unspecified edu account. Friends tell me he cut off his friends, his students, his helpers. He lives in a small room in a hostel that provides soap and toilet paper. Not a party hostel, one located close to the heart of Honolulu. There's a cleaning service once a week. No ascending to heaven, no angels to take him to his rest. Just clean linens and some bedding. Someone sent me a phone number, but I wrote him a short email instead.