Other Instruments That He Cannot Even Use Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Dying, they wait for the breath of the living, which spreads
Over them like paper ships in a river that is all too fragile:
That means nothing to creatures who cannot have it,
Creatures who are even more lost than the blindest night;
And they call for her, while the kidnappers loom like death,
And the carnivals stop turning
And dying like unjustified hearths; and the dogs weep and paw
Beside their unwed master's grave;
For they too are ashamed that he should remain so hungry for
Her meat and breath, and other instruments which he cannot
Even use.