Sixth elegy

Theater in the Round

You will not find a spot in the world--

Where death will not overtake you.

Ultimate come-from-behind sprinter,

that one / remember when you found

a book about super-marathons

and decided to take up running /

had your students read the book,

hit sidewalk / toes first / on your jogs

until 60-something knees said /

No Way! / to such dreams

of flying / legs as light as a hippo’s /

everything up in the air

at once / do mantras keep balls

in air / or do they release

our worries when they drop?

Took a photograph of a young man

walking to work beside Kahekili

practice-juggling three balls /

didn’t smile for the photo / was

too intent on completing the circuit

like musicians with their notes up

in the air, eyes meeting to avoid

mistakes, blue notes on the plank /

A performance by one man, three balls,

witnessed by a woman and her dog

is not public or private / like an actor

staging a stage on which

to face empty chairs /

a photograph of you reading

at a theater in Samoa, your killer seated

against the wall in front of me,

audience transposed

to a newspaper / my eyes

find nothing there to suggest

the later murder at the theater,

empty but for you and her / no one

reading off a script / no one to

direct the needed indirection / away

from blur of movement and voices

(if we are to believe ourselves)

toward an exit / to whom

did you call out who might’ve

heard you / who failed to hear you /

did your mantras juggle breath

and grief as you / gathered self

together deep inside your wounded

body / close to the joy of words

breathed out / if theater heals, then

who are we not to watch or breathe

Quote from The Dhammapada, translated by Gil Fronsdel, Shambala