Friday, January 5, 2018

January 5: Making Promises, Evie Shockley, "on new year's eve"

It's a strange tradition, making promises to change on January 1st of every year.  I am going to exercise more.  Eat healthier.  Spend more time with my family.  Spend less money.  Quit smoking.  The list is endless, and, of course, by January 2nd, most of those promises have already been broken.

As I've said in previous posts, I gave up on New Year's resolutions a long time ago.  A resolution is simply an opportunity to make yourself feel terrible.

So I usually make promises to myself that I know I will never be able to keep. 

This year, Saint Marty plans to win the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. 

on new year's eve

by:  Evie Shockley

       we make midnight a maquette of the year:
frostlight glinting off snow to solemnize
       the vows we offer to ourselves in near
silence: the competition shimmerwise
 
       of champagne and chandeliers to attract
laughter and cheers: the glow from the fireplace
       reflecting the burning intra-red pact
between beloveds: we cosset the space
 
       of a fey hour, anxious gods molding our
hoped-for adams with this temporal clay:
       each of us edacious for shining or
rash enough to think sacrifice will stay
 
       this fugacious time: while stillness suspends
vitality in balance, as passions
       struggle with passions for sway, the mind wends
towards what’s to come: a callithump of fashions,
 
       ersatz smiles, crowded days: a bloodless cut
that severs soul from bone: a long aching
       quiet in which we will hear nothing but
the clean crack of our promises breaking.

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