Poems are often inspired by simple comments or remarks. My good friend, Shawne Park, inspired this one this morning, with a comment he made to my post about the implications of a sign marking the end of a sidewalk the other day. In his words "the road goes on forever, and the story never ends". It occurred to me that everything actually does end for a single human. But, over the vastness of time, will there be a lone, solitary human who exists at the end of time? Are all roads unending?
I walk the road,
staring at the pavement,
oblivious to the beauty around me.
I feel the breeze
passing through the bushes and trees,
on its way to me.
The pain in my back
and joints
reminds me that I am brittle,
and that someday I will break.
But, the road goes on forever,
unimpressed with my journey.
I try to remember
the first steps I took,
and the beginning of the trek;
but I can’t recall what I felt,
or what I was thinking
when there was no pain,
when there was no breeze.
What if I had strayed from the pavement?
What if I had walked
on the grass?
What if I had taken a detour
along the way?
Would I have been able to find the road again?
I passed so many signs,
some in bold letters
and some hidden by bushes
that required a closer look.
I wonder whether some of the signs
would have changed my path.
The slower I walk,
the more I wish I had
taken the time
to alter my path.
The pavement was the easy way
to walk into the future,
unencumbered by distractions
and choices.
Now, I know
that no road goes on forever.
It just feels as if they do.
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