For Sujal

They taught us in school how to see it.

Danger, hidden as it may be
Within ourselves, or around the corner.
That’s how you knew danger lies
Not in romantic places, where one thinks of it:
Rocky cliffs, or deep in the waves, or the sudden flame of an explosion.

You saw danger hiding in our everyday
Apathy, the same apathy that leaves cancer to run reckless
Through a body. It’s in our hearts, and you told us
Not to wait, that momentum is the only cure.

So I know that if I said, “don’t go—
It’s dangerous.” You would have laughed.
The danger is here and now, in the simple ways
We expect it, still catching us unprepared.
That’s why I’m not surprised death came for you that way,
Prosaically, the death we see daily on the streets,
Walking languidly between the wheels and the curb.
The part I can’t accept is- I know
When pushed into the air, you wouldn’t fall,
You would only rise. To fall isn’t in your nature.
When the force of your convictions struck
Against those more mundane forces of gravity or attraction,
I know reality could never stop a dream in motion.

(c) 2010 Alison Hayward