Hips are the rain gutters of breath,
my yoga teacher says.
Where in the body, I wonder,
are grief’s rain gutters?
Which part can I bend
into a sluice, sweating and straining,
to let sorrow slide through?

Make yourself soft,
the teacher says when I struggle.

She’s young and can’t imagine
I want to be soft the way 
a drunk person is soft
when drink has made him oblivious
to what the world can do,
so the world can do nothing.
He can hurl himself head-on
into each inevitable tree and still manage
his jaunty stagger from the scene.