![[ ]](https://www.piltdownreview.com/assets_c/2019/01/bigstock-Empty-Red-Seats-At-The-Cinema--277925131-thumb-640x426-2915.jpg)
The custom is to sit
next to another when you enter
a dining hall or theater
alone, to fill each empty seat
as close to another as you can.
It is only a custom.
Sometimes a woman
enters a room,
a man enters a room, takes
a lone, far-off place
and thinks I am keeping my self
to myself. The burden becomes space
stretched between them.
Each person who enters
thereafter must choose:
am I of that kind or this?
whose custom should prevail?
And some of us who enter after
have doubt and seek a space
to claim, or we seek a place
to dispose of all that came before.
Some of us find we are not
of a kind; we self-displace.
We find no room within rooms.
Copyright © 2019 by Ken Farrell.
