They told me about you.

You always came to me in the end.

The end.

“Keep writing poetry, Erin,” my Literature teacher told me

At the end of the fall semester.

The end.

“Whenever you’re sad you need to draw, or you need to write,” he told me

At the end of our time.

The end.

My heart yearns for endings I think,

The way two magnets pull towards each other,

The way the autumn sucks the summer in,

Only to be devoured by winter.

My heart always longs for the credits to role,

For the happy ending and peace and closure,

For my life to finally be perfect,

                                                And stay that way.

And frankly I’m not sure if I love endings

because I am a poet

Or if I am a poet

because I love endings.

But there is one thing that I know for certain.

and this is that Poetry

has taught me

while it is okay to cherish the bliss

at the end of something

it is also okay to love beginnings.

It is okay to fall in love with sunsets as well as sunrises,

to cherish graduation ceremonies as much as the first day of school,

to leave behind one love with the hope for another,

to say goodbye. And hello.

Poetry has taught me to carefully

focus one eye on the rearview mirror

and one eye on the road ahead.

Always looking back,

always looking forward.

Simultaneously

reminiscing and

day-dreaming.

Saying goodbye.

And hello.

So to Poetry,

Thank you and

Goodbye.

Thank you and

Hello.