As a young avid reader
I always read the Introduction or Prologue,
when offered,
to see if this treatise overture
would take me some place I cared to wade through.

As an old avid reader
I always begin with the last chapter
because I may not otherwise have time to get there

Here I listen to learn if it might transport me
to some place I care about and believe in
and might even faithfully hope for

A place I have not yet been
promising a pause
wondering where I might be now
had I only visited earlier.

Biographies are especially telling
as the end where history has brought each writer
to remember what these reassembled lives and thoughts
have felt together

Now replete
unfolded
for all to see and rediscover
how extremes of final stages,
like commencement of embryonic birth,
then infant interests,
seem to land as we began

Withdrawn from adolescent fuss
and middle-aging blunder,
both respectability and revolutionary thunder

So good in our coming to,
and escape from, ripe time
now echoing warnings to intend
to start and end
each new narrative’s last chapter first.

I might not have sufficient time
to invest in earlier stages of this story’s redevelopment,
especially if the last chapter doesn’t resound
at least as health wealthy as my own
last day and night so far

Which I probably should plan
to finish writing soon.