Michael T. Young: “Endings”
ENDINGS
They pile up like driftwood at a bend
in the river. There, the scent of decay
grows over them through days and weeks.
By some definitions, it’s a stench
driving tourists away, making for that silence
in which fungi—the truly creative—begin
remaking it in their own image. The waters
corrode the barks and pack the soggy pulp
into the embankment, fertilizing the soil
with the patience of slugs and earthworms,
an endurance that waits for no victory day,
but will flower slowly into a field of thick grass
and maple trees, a place where someone,
in the swelter of summer heat, will find shade
under which to make some important decision.
Michael T. Young’s third full-length collection, The Infinite Doctrine of Water, was longlisted for the Julie Suk Award. His previous collections are The Beautiful Moment of Being Lost and Transcriptions of Daylight. He received a Fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. His chapbook, Living in the Counterpoint, received the Jean Pedrick Chapbook Award. Young’s poetry has been featured on Verse Daily and The Writer’s Almanac. It has also appeared or is forthcoming in numerous journals, including Pinyon, One Art, Talking River Review, and Vox Populi.