POETRY

A little drunk perhaps
from the lack of news,
lucid nevertheless I wait.

My long and cold legs
tired from all the insults,
warm to the embers' fate.

Winter howls its disapproval,
bewildered once more
of each and every survival.

'Tis true that we sleep poorer,
that our dish rings hollow
with the price of our fall.

But hey, so does a gold Icon
dressed up and drowned in
unwanted and spoiled food.

The dark night retreats.
A bright ray seeps into my dream.
The new year smells good.

It smells better than the frantic call
from the wife of my friend.
I say it's better than death.

Even the loss of half of a face.
Half of a tongue, a finger.
A young man losing to meth.

Another ten on a street corner.
No shortages of lost souls.
She nods, sobbing wistfully.

Happy new year I say again.
You made it through the year.
May it fall behind. Completely.

May the imagery (witchcraft really)
of a goldfish, a flower, a book
cast its hands of protection

over the fragility of your family
as it has done, more or less,
over our old and battered nation.

Jam12