Happy New Year.

And to all the hurt,
The uncertain pain,
Farewell.

Happy New Year.
Glad to see the old one go.
Not my best,
You know.
You did better, it seems –
Or so you say.

What did we miss?
By how much?
Will it come again?
Or was its essence just that moment,
Real if taken, but
If not, then always gone?

And is it smart to ask
Such things
Just when you’re almost ….?

A few months ago
I wrote an angry poem,
And at year’s end –
Cleaning house – I read it once again.
I’d written it was good –
Not to have to love you anymore.

Threw it out –
Hasn’t been a day I have not thought of you.
Your body,
Or your thought
Or your smile.

So what?
Not much.
Platitudes never bought us much.
Self delusions,
All mine perhaps.

I once thought myself a coward.
Then, in defense, as brave.
Then, assailed.
And now, in this warm December
Wallowing in the muddy sense of martyrs?
Just selfish –
And therefore very cruel.

Don’t have a resolution
I trust myself to keep.
Continued self-confusion
Is all I dare to reap.
Just hoping for the nighttime
To end the day’s hard fear,
They’ll never be a right time
To say “Happy New Year.”