New Years Day in 2026

-

 New Year’s Day

~

the man of the balancing sticks is

up to his tricks again. Tried to fool me 

with a pile of stones, almost did but still, 

I knew him. 

               What is it that makes a young woman’s fish-forearm tattoo pause, rise and picture Cliffside’s geological fingers, washed clean as they have been by this recent storm? 


While the man of the balancing sticks weighs 

and measures his treasures, a grandfather gets used to the title a year in, maybe two. 

                    His shoes on at the beach are not letting his unfailing attentions show. They too pause, picture the rocks, or is it the tide pool to the side? Maybe even those seventies jeans scribbling away under a dad-hat ineffectually cocked to one side? 

~

New Years Day in 2026.

The sun is out, but the water’s

still muddy. The pelican flies

low, the poet bites her nails.

                Only one of them struggling 

                 to remember there is no place else

                to be. 

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