The Poems With no End

A beautiful poem that answers my question.

“Should I start writing about different things? So much of my writing is about Jeffrey, or Michael, or love, or death, or my parents.”

I had this thought just as he tip-toed into the room where I was writing. I handed him a sheet of paper “Read this to me, please.” I closed my eyes, unsure of which poem from a stack I had handed to him. Here is what he read:

As to me I know of nothing else but miracles, Walt Whitman

by Amy Small McKinney

I wake: Place my feet on the blue-gray rug.
Move slowly toward the bathroom, the sink

requiring cleaning. Then notice,
in the mirror, the miracle of aging.

Then notice, in my bed,
the miracle of you, who almost didn’t find me.

The white forest of your chest,
your thighs reminding me of baobab trees

that grow without buckling, that can live
for three-thousand years, can shelter

up to forty people inside the safety
of its trunk. We are old and in love.

And I thank the universe, thank whatever
I can thank, maybe trees, maybe that cloud

shaped like a basket filled with zinnias.
And know there is no end to this poem, no end.

“And know there is no end to this poem, no end.”

Ahh, that’s why I write about these things. Because there is no end to the ways I can feel, think, believe, question, and reckon with love, death, and my closest treasures.

So I will continue writing the poem that has no end.