After the Race

For R.L.R. 1942-1980

After the Toronto Marathon, May 1980,

a local groundhog was showing off photos:

the same sunny highway we ran, but athletes

in hospital blouses, paper number patches,

limb stubs taped in plastic bags or caressing

resting crutches, eyes behind black sunglasses,

baseball caps upended for catching passing change.

Also were fellows sound in body shown twisting

along, trotting the middle line, raising an arm

to cross the finish. Everybody featured here

in fact, but me, and I sought to obscure injury

at his camera's omission, but he interpreted

anyway: "I guess it depends on what you think |

is important," he said, defending the crippled

and maimed. As answer this was incomplete.

The terrain was flat. I narrowed my gaze

at the distant horizon to narrow my emotions.

I saw a figure moving: gnat, ant, man

carrying a suitcase. It was my friend Dan,

a plumbing contractor, and a first-class runner,

as this demonstrated: a mile with a loaded bag

of pipe wrenches after racing for twenty-six.

A peculiar sweetness filled my mouth, dusty

or velvety like malt sugar, like crushed sesame

and honey, like a piece of a halvah loaf.

Panting, Dan disclosed the death of a pal:

"Gilley," he called him, "has broken his neck."

Dan was collecting for flowers, for roses

to honor this sunset to the day's slowness,

for irises cool and blue as the night's dark.

"His sister's insurance will cover burial,"

Dan said. So. And I only am escaped alone

to tell thee, I too elusive to photograph:

that there was sunlight, the sweetness of nuts

and honey, frail passageways of flowers, of life