Today’s PAD prompt was to make an event the title of a poem and then write it.
Marathon
This morning, a 26-year-old man
died after crossing the finish line —
a terrible echo of Pheidippides’ collapse —
but later in the day, four women over 70
completed the full 26.2 miles.
Nenikekamen, said the messenger.
Nenikekamen, I write
in water across your skin,
our sun-reddened limbs
on the shoreline
of sleep.
– pld
[Nenikekamen – “we are victorious” – Pheidippides’ last words]
This is really powerful.
I thought to write more but everything else is just more of that. Wow.
I love it Peg! Very fitting that the London marathon was yesterday 🙂
Thank you, ink! …the Nashville marathon was this past Saturday, and sadly, a young man did die after completing his run. (And, this morning I found out that he was a soldier who’d completed five tours of duty in Afghanistan and Iraq, which makes the echo even stronger and sadder…)
Happily, the four female finishers over seventy are also directly from this year’s results. 🙂