Prologue to the New Year

Two leaves that turn around
The same bud-pointed stem–
How else depict the clock,
Whose hands follow the sun
Although it’s somewhere else,
And now the year is ending,
The new about to start.
With you beside me, where
To find a better time
Which can be near or far,
Than here, the growing now,
As we reach out across
The shuffling sea of words,
Whose meaning like the waves
Disperses on the rocks
Of unexplored emotions.
All we can do is wait
(There is no other choice)
For days to roll out of
The bag within that bag,
That carryall, the year.
There can be nothing better
Than waiting, as outside
We see the conversation
Of leaves and the assent
Of myrtle and gardenia,
And something like a song
Enters our ears, as from
A small bird’s visitation
Announced by larger than
Itself, and we forget
The cuckoo clock’s insistence,
And our fears, knowing that
We never are alone,
Not in life, not in death–
We hear a baby’s laughter
In every person’s sorrow,
The swish of a small tail
Within the stagnant pond,
Which bursts with little breaths.
The vastness over us
Becomes a brilliant garden
With asters white as stars
Giving our thoughts their sparkles
As in the Milky Way.
Time may be like a vine
That makes a single turn
With every year, which keeps
Giving the same reminder–
Follow the sun, rise up,
And be one with the Light.

But what to say of night
And its inviting cup?
There is much to remember
Except that one just sleeps
With nothing in return.
Night plays games with the mind
And asks, “What did you say?”
But one speaks only garbles
And finds nothing but hours
Advancing without pardon
Time turns into a circus
Of seasons–births and deaths
And then the life beyond,
The port to which we sail
With just the heart as cargo.
Does anything else matter
That’s not a shibboleth?
Is truth a little bone
For a puppy or a cat?
We know the indolence
Of days, the false regret
Of him, the also-ran,
The fatal hesitation,
The fading sound of drum
And the applauding throng,
The self-defeating mania
That grows out of a bent
Heart that knows no compassion.
We wait as for a ride
Across a certain water
That is both far and near,
And none of us should lag
Behind, because I love
You, and I hear your voice
In every song–our fate
Winds up the revolutions
Of the sun, which unlocks
The door to that which saves,
Turns our joys into herds
Galloping through fields that cross
Rivers, which under vow
Must stand for what we are.
Silence puts every mime
Under its watchful care.
We do not hear the cart
But see and feel it rolling.
The night is full of bells
Whose ringing is long gone.
And time, unlike a rock,
Is a chrysanthemum
That falls without a sound.