Kathy, Carla
By Hannah Lowe
The body is something like a poem, I guess,
As I watch my yoga teacher – Kathy –
on the back-row mat of Carla’s yoga class.
Kathy can do King Pigeon, Crow, Full Monkey –
yet here she is, in a simple forward bend
while Carla lays her palms around her core
to push her deeper. Can every pose be deepened,
I wonder? Can what’s been mastered be mastered more?
A poem is something like a body, I guess,
when I’m holding someone else’s poem
in this sun-filled room they’ve called a ‘masterclass’.
I’m not a master, just a pair of palms
which push or pull or loosen someone’s lines –
I still need kind and guiding hands on mine.
