He liked to believe that
The narrative of his life
Followed some meaningful,
Discernable arc.

But the closer he got
To the end,
The more people he knew
Who died long before
There was any recognizable plot.

They just died
Right in the middle of their story.
As though death
Was not some great culmination
But an inconsequential blip
In someone else’s saga.

Maybe he is not the star of his own story.
Maybe he is just an extra on the set
Of someone else’s epic.

Or maybe a foreign film,
A language he does not speak,
Blundering around the set
In a costume that does not fit.