Have Some Faith in the Obvious

The people who try hardest to face up
To the blunt fact of dying grow most
Tempted to imagine forms of immortality.

How else to explain the saints and sages
Who brood on inevitability when young
And come to obsess over hell or alchemy?

The more ordinary people try not to think
About death at all, try to take for granted
Whatever afterlife their parents promised.

In honesty about the obvious is too much
Capacity for a weedy tendency to despair,
And most people cope by a mild denial.

There are our neighbors and coworkers
And household finances to worry about
First, and all the careful keeping score

Of who is doing well or doing poorly, who
Roots for or belongs to the better sort
Of communities and teams, who is sick

And who is good and who is wicked
And who is recovering and what fun
Can be had today or tonight or tomorrow

And what chores and fears can be easily
Disposed of, and good for us, and good
For them, and shame on everyone else.

Meanwhile the monk in the cell, the sage
Chanting in the tower make themselves
Useless, trying to transcend the obvious.