A Poem for Starting the New Year

 On the Threshold of 2021

                Again I begin
On the threshold of the year
To re-determin-ate the myth
                To end its past determined path
                                the year of death and isolation
                                induced by politics, disease, and natural disaster
                                Annus horribilis
                To create instead a myth of my making

                Open a door once more on promise

                                violets, not violence

                                chorus of birds not angry words

                                the intent of truth to unbend crooked lies

                                arms that hug like angels' wings

                                                without harm of viral things

But I did not choose to lose so much last year

And no matter how I yearn to turn the myth my way

                                this year

                to make it mind my kind of story

                to pen it from my yen for joy,

From this threshold

                it seems too bold to hold such hope

                it seems like pipe dreams and hype

                                mythic fantasy of a mystic type

But I can dream of miracles and truths

I can aspire to higher luck than last year's muck.

I can want

and hope

and welcome, oh,

                annus mirabilis!