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DocuSign Envelope ID: DED368CC-D87F-4704-8F64-B8F2DB10EE93 <br /> "Path," The South Dakota Review, Fall/Winter 2010 <br /> Path <br /> Down the road, a path through the woods <br /> leads to graves where the tombstones are <br /> too weathered to be read. !;eside the path, <br /> a tree nu never know by genus or species, <br /> its roots torn from the ground by a strong wind <br /> years ago. Now its a mound over which the earth <br /> has grown, upon which some vines have grown <br /> in their own twisted way. <br /> I like to think that some of our languages <br /> will last, our words like rocks polished in tumblers. <br /> And what of our children and their families? <br /> And what of the people who will live here <br /> decades from now?And why can't anything go on <br /> in a man's heart that hasn't gone on <br /> in a man's heart before?Years ago, <br /> the Occaneechi lived on the land <br /> we now call home. They too would have seen bottom <br /> in a drought in a summer in which our rivulet <br /> ran dry. I stand beside it now, in a year <br /> in which water is too plentiful <br /> to be sacred. The sun overhead casts a long shadow. <br /> I stretch my arms and bend my knees. <br /> Even my longest shadow disappears <br /> when I walk amongst the trees. <br /> K. B.Young 11 <br />