delivered at the moment of parting as if in flight or retreat; "paused to deliver a parting shot at the door"; "a Parthian volley of expletives from Uncle Billy"- Bret Harte
a pernicious and malign influence that is hard to get rid of; "racism is a pestilence at the heart of the nation"; "according to him, I was the canker in their midst"
the end of a word (a suffix or inflectional ending or final morpheme); "I don't like words that have -ism as an ending"
event whose occurrence ends something; "his death marked the ending of an era"; "when these final episodes are broadcast it will be the finish of the show"