This is a poem I wrote when I was 26. Feels like I wrote it for my older self. What a thoughtful youth I was.
End of the Road
As people age, they become more themselves,
Less society’s construct.
As if our culture, obsessed with youth,
forgot to lay a path for old age.
For some, this is a tragedy:
Concrete conformity peters out,
Stranding them on dirt and gravel,
They stumble through their last years.
For others, a liberation:
As bruising asphalt fades
Revealing long-sought paths,
Through private wilderness.
–Syne Mitchell
Love the sentiment and imagery. .
Thank you! I had forgotten that I used to write poetry, and unearthed this while converting some floppy disc files over. It was interesting to re-discover things I’d written in the early ’90s.
I hope I am the latter type of aging person.
Nicely done. I’m a fan of your SF novels and believe you shouldn’t be surprised that your younger self could look forward through time.