Glitter in the Air (Pink)

Too funny!  I was going through my blog drafts and ran across this one dated January 31, 2023... all ready to go except for the book.  Hated to let it go to waste so, I just found a book and am posting now, revisiting a slice of my life from 8 months ago.  A virtual time capsule!  So many things have changed since then.  That's Life, right?... 🤷

"Have you ever wished for an endless night?

Lassoed the moon and the stars and pulled that rope tight

Have you ever held your breath and asked yourself will it ever get better than tonight?"

Can't even remember what show or movie I was watching a few weeks ago when this song popped up... so I filed it away for later.  Later is now... 😍

Despite my pain issues (dissipating but still here), I am feeling very lucky these days with my overly-full yet beyond-joy-filled life:

~ The True North Project Pam invited me to be on the board of is really taking off; we are now officially a non-profit, we have a fiscal sponsor and a bank account.  Waiting on website construction as well as a logo for branding, and then we should be able to go live with what's on the books and what's in the works.  Did I tell you I'm flying up to Maryland the last weekend of March for our inaugural concert?  Pam has also asked me to collaborate with her on booking, and one of my goals is to invite/confirm Dar for the fall/winter season.  I will make this happen!

~ ~ This week is the SFFF (actually now called the South Florida Folk and Acoustic Music Festival).  I've been very busy with the festival prep, not as a board or staff member but, as Dar would call it, a Conscious Bridger in many behind-the-scenes ways.  It feels good to help.

~ Went to Bryan's (the horticulturist/plant provider for the festival stages, one of the connections I made) today to trade a book (Late Migrations, my discovery toward the end of 2022) for a plant (he's been telling me about Lady of the Night, which blooms every full moon; next one is February 5!).  He played me a John Prine song on guitar (I of course cried), toured me around his nursery, and gave me a witch ball, which I hung on my balcony when I got home.

~ Our A/C went down last night but, after a phone call this a.m., they showed up at 2 p.m. to fix it (just needed unclogging, which happens once or twice a year in South Florida).

~ Had a great two-hour phone chat with Michele when I got home from Bryan's (also the library to pick up Bitch); we haven't talked (texted and e-mailed, yes) since the week after Christmas, and we were long overdue.

~ Sarah called to check in (busy weekend for her), Eric has had quite a few Zoom job interviews in anticipation of his move to Atlanta, and Rob's talking about posting on his blog again.

~ Robert and I feel more in balance and at peace lately; even when things are rocky between us, he almost always gives me a back massage when I come to bed, and he's been even more attentive these last few days with my pulled/strained muscle(s).  Touch is definitely one of my Love Languages, both giving as well as receiving.

~ I abandoned a book after Fadiman, and last night I started Lessons in Chemistry, which I love so far.  Please let it continue!

SONG:  Glitter in the Air by Pink

BOOK:  JOMO: Celebrate the Joy of Missing Out! by Jessica Misener

POEM(S):  BYOF by Maya Stein

It’s a new day. Bring your own fork. Bring your own footwear. Bring your own

fragrance, your own faith, your flamboyance, your fetishes, your fashionable lateness.

Become your own fantasy. Be your one friend. Believe yesterday was only a fragment.

Make a betrothal of yeses on fortune. Brush last year’s offenses free. Banish

your outdated fury. Breathe. Yearn. Opine. Flex. Or bleat. Or yodel. Or remember

how to be frivolous. Break yourself out of what no longer fits. Bloom. Occupy your body

as it were flowering perennially. Write your blessings down, or yell them, opulently,

into the span of a quiet forest. Brave the yeti of an old fear. Bulldoze the yoke

of what’s keeping you fixed. Burn the yardstick, the odometer, the flagrant shames.

Build your radiance from the flames.

i am running into a new year by Lucille Clifton

i am running into a new year

and the old years blow back

like a wind

that i catch in my hair

like strong fingers like

all my old promises and

it will be hard to let go

of what i said to myself

about myself

when i was sixteen and

twenty-six and thirty-six

even thirty-six but

i am running into a new year

and i beg what i love and

i leave to forgive me

Storage by Mary Oliver

When I moved from

one house to another,

there were many things

I had no room for.

What does one do?

I rented a storage space

and filled it.

Years passed.

Occasionally,

I went there

and looked in,

but nothing happened,

not a single twinge

of the heart.

As I grew older

the things I cared about

grew fewer but were

more important,

so one day I undid the lock

and called the trash man.

He took everything.

I felt like the little donkey

when his burden is finally

lifted.

Things! Burn them, burn them!

Make a beautiful fire!

More room in your heart

for Love, for the trees.

For the birds who own

nothing;

✨

the reason they

can fly."

QUOTE:  “And now let us believe in a long year that is given to us, new, untouched, full of things that have never been...” ~ Rainer Maria Rilke 

Bring Love

wherever you go.

Shine Light

wherever it's dark.

Leave Blessings 

wherever you've been.

Be Kind

wherever you are.

~ Mary Davis

Can You Understand My Joy? (John Gorka)

An e-mail statement from Joe Biden today, Saturday, November 7, 2020 12:46 pm

"I am honored and humbled by the trust the American people have placed in me and in Vice President-elect Harris.

In the face of unprecedented obstacles, a record number of Americans voted. Proving once again, that democracy beats deep in the heart of America.

With the campaign over, it’s time to put the anger and the harsh rhetoric behind us and come together as a nation.

It’s time for America to unite. And to heal.

We are the United States of America. And there’s nothing we can’t do, if we do it together.

I’m going to speak to the nation tonight and I’d love for you to watch."

I (and most of my circle of friends) have been watching television (mainly MSNBC and CNN) around the clock since Tuesday night at 7 p.m.  Admittedly, election returns looked glum at first, because Trump had been decrying mail-in ballots and encouraging his supporters to vote the day of, but it soon became evident that mail-in ballots were primarily Democratic... and the vote count, albeit glacial, continued to skew blue.

Went to bed early last night because I was feeling, as we say in the South, "puny" (due to exhaustion and stress) and slept 11 hours.  Woke up this morning still not feeling up-to-speed (the gloomy weather didn't help), curled up on the chaise in my living room, swaddled in fleece and sipping jasmine hot tea, and turned on MSNBC (my default channel).  Still the same numbers.  Ack.

Decided to find something compelling on Netflix settled on the remake of Rebecca, and my friend/college roomie Linda texted at 11:30 a.m.:  "Election called.  Thank God!!!!!!" (Pennsylvania... 💓), at which point I shrieked and then shared the news with the handful of text threads that have sustained me this week.  I taught my grandson Colin last night to say Joe Biden, and asked Sarah to video it this morning, which makes me smile every time I watch it... 😍

My friend Judi said she saw a meme that keeps making her laugh:  "My three-year-old asked me when I was going to stop watching "The Map Show"... 😄

As some have speculated (and I have no doubt that most of us have been, and will continue to, Go High), I don't want to "watch him burn", but I acknowledge in my mind, heart, and soul that Trump treated the citizens of this country (and the world) with severe disrespect and dishonesty (not to mention contributing to the deaths of a quarter-million people through his inadequate handling of the coronavirus).  He will exit this presidency as he has inhabited it:  "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing" (Shakespeare, of course).

And now Nevada has been called in Biden's favor as well, bringing the numbers to Joe Biden 279, Donald Trump 214.  Arizona is looking good to stay Blue as well and, although Georgia will go to a recount, the numbers should stay in Biden's favor.  I won't do the math just yet, but let's just say 300+.  Zippity!

Van Jones (of CNN), upon hearing the news of Biden's win... 

I am still watching MSNBC.  Look at all those women, people of color, LGBTQ flags, kids... all of them wearing masks.  This is my America... 💖

SONG:  Can You Understand My Joy? by John Gorka (can't find a video, but here are the lyrics; thanks to MegHS for the heads-up to this song!)

BOOK:  The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World by Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Douglas Carlton Abrams

POEM(S):  Monkey Mind by Denise Duhamel (written and posted 

I know the worth of each state’s electoral votes by heart. My neck pain

has stopped but has traveled to my elbow and wrist. “Three consecutive

deep breaths” written on post-its, one beside the coffee pot and another

on my bathroom mirror. How many times this fall have I been told

“remember to breathe”? Yoga instructor, therapy group, strength-training

teacher, all on Zoom. When I was a kid I watched “Zoom” (Who are you?

What do you do? … Come on and Zoom Zoom went the theme song.) The kids

featured on Boston’s WGBH were local celebrities and my monkey mind

wonders what happened to them as I jump from tree to tree. I recently started

the Netflix series Ratched, the origin story of Nurse Mildred Ratched

(before One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest). On her job interview, the titular character

says she’s not worried about patients throwing their own feces,

that nothing throws her, which reminds me of monkeys who also throw

their own feces when they are defensive, angry, or bored. I only made it through

the first episode of Ratched. I wanted to like it because I like Sarah Paulson

and am glad she is getting work, but I found the show trying too hard, too stylized,

like Mad Men but without as strong a narrative. Then I tried The Queen’s

Gambit but I know almost nothing about chess which the boys I grew up with

called “chest” to see if we girls would blush. And even now, whenever I read

or write or say “titular” I feel self-conscious because the word contains “tit.”

I remember at a writers’ conference many years ago, a famous poet wanted us all

to go to a “titty bar” (her words). And I said something like,

“I just checked in with my feminist principles and the answer is no.”

But now strippers are seen as empowered by some in the third wave and I guess

I’d need a more nuanced answer if she ever asked again. Not that “titty bars”

are even open in this time of COVID-19. That famous poet couldn’t have been

third wave all those years ago, could she? She’s a few years older than I am.

Maybe she was more revolutionary, better read. I can’t believe two grandpas

are running for the president, the election less than 48 hours away.

You know who I voted for (early) since no poet could be a Trump supporter,

could she? Remember in 2016 when there was a fake story that Trump

was going to invite an American poet of Scottish ancestry (who also played

the bag pipes) to his inauguration? I fell for it for a few minutes, but I don’t fall

for much anymore. I believe Trump’s imaginary inaugural poet was known

for his limericks. When I was a kid I loved Lime Rickeys and Del’s Lemonade,

a slushy concoction that lost fans because occasionally they’d slurp a seed

or piece of rind up through the straw. That only made me love Del’s more—

its authenticity, its real lemons. I bought a lemon but it was red, a Kia

which my then-husband said was inferior to our dying Honda Civic

which he was used to. But the Kia is so much cheaper, I argued, and won.

Then for two years we kept returning to the dealer because the interior smelled

like gas and the workers would reattach some hose that kept coming loose.

One time, when we were traveling, we almost passed out from the fumes.

We stopped at a garage and a mechanic said, This car could catch fire at any minute,

so we looked up the lemon laws but had stuck it out with the Kia too long.

We traded the car in and got the Civic my husband wanted in the first place

and I’m not sure if I said I’m sorry or you were right because by then

we were always fighting and I may have been stubborn like the time

we were in a crowded hotel, waiting to check in, and he insisted we were

in the wrong line. He walked away and sat defiantly on a lobby couch.

I had to move our two giant suitcases by myself each time the line crept forward.

It turned out I was right, but shortly thereafter, a therapist asked

Do you want to be right or do you want to be happy? Now I am in group therapy

and the facilitator finally last week let us talk about politics as she said

it was the elephant in the room. We all hated the big fat elephant in office

and wanted him out. What if he wipes out Social Security in three years?

What about the climate? Two of us in the Zoom group had been already hit

by hurricanes this fall. After each rain, Julie’s Florida street is flooded

to such an extent that ducks congregate and think it’s a lake. Only an October snow

stopped the fires from spreading to Maureen’s house in Colorado.

And what about the overrun hospitals? It’s too late to contract trace now,

says The New York Times—the virus is everywhere. And what about my mother

in the nursing home? No visitors, no activities, twenty-two of her neighbors

dead from the virus. She survived the spring, but will she survive the fall?

When will I be able to see her again? My mother has type O blood,

I keep telling myself, and though the low rates of infection are anecdotal,

I’ll take it. I’ve forgotten my own blood type—I think it’s A or B,

as I’m quite sure I was never a universal donor. And I never had to worry

about an Rh factor since I didn’t have kids. I remember pricking my own finger

in junior high and then testing for my blood type along with all the other students,

though I don’t remember the outcome. I bet now kids can’t perform this test

because of COVID-19, because of AIDS. For so many years my friends

and I were afraid to get HIV just the way we are afraid of COVID now.

Condoms then. Now masks. No dinner parties now, no parties at all.

I teach my Zoom classes and miss driving to and from school in my reliable Honda

though it’s not the Honda I mentioned earlier. That one finally died,

shortly after my marriage did. I thought my then-husband stole it

though I soon learned that you can’t steal communal property.

He simply drove it to the Miami airport and parked it in the closest,

most expensive lot, then hopped a plane to Madrid. It took me a week

before he’d let me know where he was, where he’d parked, then another

month before he was ready to come home. By then it was too late.

Some situations can’t be saved. I hope democracy can, even our half-assed version.

I hope the seas can be saved. Scientists just found a reef as tall as the Empire State

Building. I remember how my mom had a panic attack when she took us there.

Before we could look through the view finders we had to cut the line

to get back to the elevator and down to the street. I was five that trip

to New York and, though it wasn’t the worst part of my childhood, I wonder

what it did to me, to see my mom come undone in front of strangers.

I love heights and rarely get dizzy, even on the scariest amusement park rides

or parasailing. As I welcome the rush, I wonder if I am compensating for something.

I wonder if I am getting compensated fairly. When I was hired, I should have asked

for more money, but I accepted the offer immediately. The chair

of the English Department seemed shocked and then said, “Okay. I’ll send over

the paperwork.” I didn’t think I was entitled. Not like our entitled president.

Though he won the election without the popular vote, he acted like Mr. Popularity—

cutting regulations, nominating nutjob judges and justices, lining his own pockets

like the world owed him. I would have been a tentative president, my feelings

of illegitimacy on display. I would have worked with the other side, trying

to get my enemies to like me. Even now I leap from branch to branch

by my monkey tail, quite certain I’ll never be able to calm my monkey mind

until all the votes are in. I surrender my brain, my body, my own white flag.

[From the poet, written and shared yesterday:  “Forty-eight hours after the presidential election, I am still filled with anxiety, hope, and dread. Monkey Mind tries to capture a slice of where my mind travels to these days.”]

Joy by Donna Henderson

I was so hungry!

& my hunger longed for the bite-sized Joy

in my pocket, its luscious

crush in my teeth,

almond soul from the brown glaze

sweetly releasing.

But my plans! – To hike the length of the Spit,

then have my Joy when I've earned it –

But my Joy wouldn't let me

loose from the lot unpartaken.

Whispered, my hunger,

          Have it now, let it sustain you.

Joy's not the end, Joy's

the way.

Believe This by Richard Levine

All morning, doing the hard, root-wrestling

work of turning a yard from the wild

to a gardener’s will, I heard a bird singing

from a hidden, though not distant, perch;

a song of swift, syncopated syllables sounding

like, Can you believe this, believe this, believe?

Can you believe this, believe this, believe?

And all morning, I did believe. All morning,

between break-even bouts with the unwanted,

I wanted to see that bird, and looked up so

I might later recognize it in a guide, and know

and call its name, but even more, I wanted

to join its church. For all morning, and many

a time in my life, I have wondered who, beyond

this plot I work, has called the order of being,

that givers of food are deemed lesser

than are the receivers. All morning,

muscling my will against that of the wild,

to claim a place in the bounty of earth,

seed, root, sun and rain, I offered my labor

as a kind of grace, and gave thanks even

for the aching in my body, which reached

beyond this work and this gift of struggle.

QUOTE:  “Joy is spontaneously breaking out all over America right now. I predict that you’re going to see large crowds all over the country celebrating what has just happened.  It’s okay for us to wallow in that for awhile.” ~ former senator Claire McCaskill

Do Re Mi (Maria and the Von Trapp Children)

We had a lovely Easter Sunday yesterday - my son Rob worked, getting home about 5-ish, and we ate a bit before 6 (Eric was home from college for the weekend). I made Poppyseed Chicken (my sister's recipe), brown rice, steamed broccoli, steamed carrots with dill weed and a homemade apple cobbler for dessert - Sarah and I even dyed Easter eggs. I never made it out walking... but figured I could use a bit of a break, since I had followed through the previous six days in a row - so proud of myself!

We hung out until about 10, watching the first half of The Sound of Music (thus the synchronicity of the above YouTube video appearing in my inbox today)... and then Sarah headed home and the boys went out together - I watched some mindless TV and fell asleep on the couch, exhausted after the whirlwind weekend (my Labyrinth Cafe concert, with one of the artists staying with us Friday and Saturday night)...

Today has been an attempt to catch up: laundry, putting the Ozfice back in place (folding up sleep couch, etc.), finishing the dishes I let soak in the sink last night - I still need to get in my walk... and work seriously on the local Pete Seeger event as well as write the Order of Service for my UU Earth Day service this Sunday. I also took Reba out to lunch as she leaves tomorrow to head back to her home in Maryland - I'll miss her...

SONG: Do Re Mi, as sung by Julie Andrews and children in The Sound of Music

BOOK: The Mysticism of Sound and Music by Hazrat Inayat Khan

POEM: Snow Geese by Mary Oliver

Oh, to love what is lovely, and will not last!

What a task

to ask

of anything, or anyone,

yet it is ours,

and not by the century or the year, but by the hours.

One fall day I heard

above me, and above the sting of the wind, a sound

I did not know, and my look shot upward; it was

a flock of snow geese, winging it

faster than the ones we usually see,

and, being the color of snow, catching the sun

so they were, in part at least, golden. I

held my breath

as we do

sometimes

to stop time

when something wonderful

has touched us

as with a match,

which is lit, and bright,

but does not hurt

in the common way,

but delightfully,

as if delight

were the most serious thing

you ever felt.

The geese

flew on,

I have never seen them again.

Maybe I will, someday, somewhere.

Maybe I won't.

It doesn't matter.

What matters

is that, when I saw them,

I saw them

as through the veil, secretly, joyfully, clearly.

QUOTE: "As your faith is strengthened you will find that there is no longer the need to have a sense of control, that things will flow as they will, and that you will flow with them, to your great delight and benefit." ~ Emmanuel

I Lost on Jeopardy (Weird Al Yankovic)

I'm taking a bit of a break from the weariness of the world (which will still be here tomorrow) to celebrate the joyfulness - three really amazing things have happened/are happening and I had to honor them...

First of all, I finally took the online Jeopardy test - my friend Judi told me about it at book club the other night, and there was one more evening left to try out. For as long as I can remember, I've watched the challenging game show and tested my wits against the three nightly contestants - I always remember to phrase my answer in the form of a question, even in the informality of my family room... and, considering I don't have that pesky eye-hand-coordination buzzer to contend with, I do a respectable job of appearing knowledgable. I'm not claiming to be that smart but I have a font of useless information cluttering up my brain - every once in a while it comes in handy, such that, whoever is in the room usually says with enthusiastic awe, "you really should try out to be on the show!".

So.. as soon as I got home from book club, I registered and read the rules... and logged on the following evening 20 minutes beforehand to test out my Flash player, get settled, etc. Thirty seconds before the test was scheduled to begin (8 PM Pacific, 11 PM Eastern), the familiar Jeopardy theme song began... as did my stomach butterflies - they tell you in advance to pay attention to the category, you do not have to follow the in-the-form-of-a-question format and you have 15 seconds to type in your answer, at which point you can hit Enter or allow the test to capture whatever you've managed to type thus far.

It was fun, in that weird, stressful, time-limited kinda way - some felt like no-brainers (who wrote the Oz books? - jackpot!)... a few others were above my level of comprehension (something about x, y, domain, function?!?). A few I totally blanked on, and most I tried to at least submit *something* - you quickly find out that 15 seconds feels like no time at all to process much less enter trivia, and I tried to allow my intuition to take over (don't second-guess) and not get discouraged if I didn't know something (which could have affected my answers following). They say that they will not disclose your score, one way or the other and that they will notify you if chosen - the next step would be an in-person tryout in the city of your choice (Miami, in my case). Out of 50 questions, I actually think I got more than half right - wish me luck (oh, to be able to meet Alex Trebek is one of my heart's desires!).
Secondly, Boyhowdy at Cover Lay Down has been suffering from inner ear problems for a few months and, in his words, "last week, in a spate of concern about losing a week of posting to my continuing tinnitus, I asked a few of my favorite folkbloggers to donate 'a fave coversong or two, and a short write-up to accompany it'. The plan was to collect coverfolk from bloggers I trust, on the likely chance that I could not blog as my best self for a while, and have it ready to share with you as a celebration of my blogging peers and influences." - I was one of the people he asked to submit a guest blog (!). Big honor (major understatement) - part 1 can be found here...
Thirdly (be still, my heart!), I will be leaving the house shortly for the Dar Williams concert at the Culture Room in Ft. Lauderdale - we've organized quite a contingent of South Florida folks and I've been promoting the show like crazy. It's at a local rock club and we may end up standing all evening - we're troopers and she's worth it (win/win!).

SONG: I Lost on Jeopardy by Weird Al Yankovic (a parody of the song Jeopardy by the Greg Kihn Band)

BOOK: Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs by Ken Jennings
POEM: Follow Your Bliss by Joseph Campbell

The divine manifestation is ubiquitous,
Only our eyes are not open to it.
Awe is what moves us forward.

Live from your own center.
The divine lives within you.
The separateness apparent in the world is secondary.
Beyond the world of opposites is an unseen,
but experienced, unity and identity in us all.

Today the planet is the only proper "in group."
Participate joyfully in the sorrows of the world.
We cannot cure the world of sorrows,
but we can choose to live in joy.

You must return with the bliss and integrate it.
The return is seeing the radiance is everywhere.
The world is a match for us.
We are a match for the world.
The spirit is the bouquet of nature.

Sanctify the place you are in.
Follow your bliss. . . .

QUOTE: "Life must be aromatic." ~ Gwendolyn Brooks

Overjoyed (Christine Kane)

Given the New Year's Eve reference, I was planning to save this song for my December 31 blog - however, also given the fact the amazing Christine Kane played our concert series last night, the choice to use it today is obvious, even more so since the title so aptly describes my state of mind today!

As I've posted before, Christine and I have a history spanning back to February 2000 and it was such a pleasure to be able to present her - since she normally plays larger halls and festivals, it was both fortuitous and syncronistic that the timing and geography aligned to afford a South Florida performance. What was especially refreshing was finding out Christine has a substantial fanbase in the area, proved by the number of phone calls and e-mails I received inquiring about tickets and/or making reservations, some coming from as far as Stuart and even Alaska (long, cool story there) - we're always looking to widen the circle, and it's nice to hear when people accidentially stumble into, and are thrilled to discover, our local folk community.

We had a full house and Christine was her usual warm, wise and witty self... breaking our hearts with the tender songs (I'm with You, She Don't Like Roses), cracking us up with the wacky ones (No Such Thing As Girls Like That, Four Legs Good Two Legs Bad) and weaving them all together with her superb storytelling skills - she played all the requests, even honoring my own of Joni's Both Sides Now (after I read on her blog that she'd performed the cover at a concert a few months ago).

Loved the new tunes (I Am the Moon, The Real World) - How Not to Behave could be my new favorite Christine song, especially considering it contained a lyric that evoked my recent hard drive crash (AFGO - Another F*cking Growth Opportunity... :-)

After the show, we went to Peter Pan Diner, a local 24-hour diner/bakery/lounge (!) that provides great food (with a 20-page menu to choose from), as well as an avenue to people-watch - a salad/basket of onion rings/spinach omelet later, we headed back to my place where we continued our conversation and played with my dog Rocky (who adores Christine too!). Both of us were up by 9:00 and out of the house by 10:30 this morning, me to church and Christine to drive to Tarpon Springs for her house concert tonight.

On the way to church, driving in the opposite direction on the interstate for miles and miles and miles (95 south to 595 west was devoted to their exclusive use) were thousands of motorcycles participating in the 20th annual South Florida President's Council Christmas Toys in the Sun Run to benefit Joe DiMaggio Children's Hospital Foundation - after the emotion of last night's show, my sleep deprivation of the last four days and the idea that thousands of people were giving from their hearts and wallets in order to make this holiday more hopeful for others... well, I just got downright weepy.

I am such a lucky woman, to be surrounded by the music I love (and those who make it), dear friends and new acquaintances who appreciate the sharing and a community that reaffirms my faith in the goodness of people - one can never have too much joy in one's life... <3

SONG: Overjoyed by Christine Kane

BOOK: A Thousand Names for Joy: Living in Harmony with the Way Things Are by Byron Katie, Stephen Mitchell

POEM: Lute Music by Kenneth Rexroth

The Earth will be going on a long time

Before it finally freezes;

Men will be on it; they will take names,

Give their deeds reasons.

We will be here only

As chemical constituents—

A small franchise indeed.

Right now we have lives,

Corpuscles, Ambitions, Caresses,

Like everybody had once—

Here at the year's end, at the feast

Of birth, let us bring to each other

The gifts brought once west through deserts—

The precious metal of our mingled hair,

The frankincense of enraptured arms and legs,

The myrrh of desperate, invincible kisses—

Let us celebrate the daily

Recurrent nativity of love,

The endless epiphany of our fluent selves,

While the earth rolls away under us

Into unknown snows and summers,

Into untraveled spaces of the stars.

QUOTE: "Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us." ~ Hal Borland