Solace in the New Year

Fog, turning to mist, then clearing slowly. 

A campus stroll. Four dogs, six people, five cars, empty archways, empty hallways, one overheard bit of chatter, one conversation (Merry Christmas, Happy New Year).

Mostly silence except for the dripping on and off stone and leaf. 

My kind of new beginning.

What's Old Is New Again

Burning the New Year
by Naomi Shihab Nye

Letters swallow themselves in seconds.

Notes friends tied to the doorknob,

transparent scarlet paper,

sizzle like moth wings,

marry the air.

So much of any year is flammable,

lists of vegetables, partial poems.

Orange swirling flame of days,

so little is a stone.

Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,

an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.

I begin again with the smallest numbers.

Quick dance, shuffle of losses and leaves,

only the things I didn’t do

crackle after the blazing dies.

A New Year

"Kiva probably won't be here next Christmas," A said seriously. "Mom told me."

At fifteen, Kiva is an old dog, a survivor and a loved family member.

I see her and remember the puppy who bounced and bounced like a ball from spot to spot in my niece's first Brevard house. I see her and remember the mountain house where my niece and her husband lived and where her son was christened and where her mother, my sister-in-law, died. I see her and think of my old cat Lucy, who didn't make it to Christmas this year.

And when C spontaneously cuddles with Kiva on her pillow, it's hard to take the picture.