I’ve started thinking about endings
as beginnings,
life as a relay race.
You are handed the baton and
go: 40 billion heartbeats
pressed deep into the dirt.
A rock is dropped into a still pond
and the water unspools,
a soft unraveling of almosts.
My feet face forward,
but the past hums low,
a shadow in the marrow.
There are days I feel like the echo
instead of the sound.
A field after the thunder.
Everything broken, open,
the way some trees only flower
after fire.
