Mandala of the mountain path

Chloe Martinez

The monk goes to bed early, rises pre-dawn, his robes
identical to other monks’ robes, his routine fixed 
and spacious: meditate. Study. Consume a small meal,

perhaps, and rest. The monk is not sharing his bed
with a preschooler who is fully potty-trained this week,
I hope. My in-laws went to Tibet, brought us back

a framed photograph of the Potala Palace. It hangs
in the bathroom: the impossible Himalayan peaks, the sharp 
whitewashed walls, the garlands of stairways leading up 

to another world. The monk sits on cushions on the floor,
his posture and breath perfected over time. He need not
squeeze in a mammogram before daycare pickup. His mind

is clear. I imagine it that way, anyway. Nothing against 
the monk. His path is hardly an easy one. The icy 
air up there; the leader in exile; the palace

turned museum; the yellow silk robe with its empty 
sleeves folded on the golden throne. But sometimes
I am thinking a thought and then my husband and children 

all shout at once: they have misplaced the things they need
right now and only I can find them. Nothing for it. No way
to be good enough, to make much progress through the

triple world. The dishes always waiting to be washed
though I hardly even cook: my husband cooks and cooks.
The dishwasher is small. Load it like someone climbing

a steep path, each dish placed gingerly all the way up
to the top—the round dome of the temple, the spinning
prayer wheel, the clean wind whipping the bright flags ragged.