When 2019 Arrives

Resolutions are the arrow to the land across the water

This year drains from the grass, the river swells to the edge

Of the sandy cliff until you feel the float of the ground itself

Sundered from the stable upland across the drowned sky.

Resolve to go before the hollow places

Bored into the foundation by evaporated friendships

Empty and fill again with the run-off years,

Cracking the clay and shearing movement.

Resolute as the sun saluting the day:

I have been proud to light your specificities

I have been proud to feed your breathing

Do not melt upon the waters. Go.

---

I've been watching end-of-the-year videos on BookTube for the past several days and thinking about how the books of 2018 have passed through my life, the way this year the news in general has felt like a weekly disaster vlog and just, in general, letting myself miss people and places I've cared about. 2018, for me, has been a host of minor instabilities strung on a spine of retrenchment--minor fender benders, losing for a second time a library home-away-from-home, having the weather interrupt plans...minor stuff but adding up to the feeling that things are careening a little closer than comfortable. We're out more (looking at Christmas lights, etc.) and so is the rest of the city and so you see more wreckage and emergency lights as well as holiday lights.

When the image above was chosen for The Sunday Muse, my first reaction was "Yeah, no, I'm more burrow-into-the-clay than set-sail-into-the-evening." But...retrenching didn't really lead to any breakthroughs. Sitting at home with my writing didn't lead to writing. The house is not substantially better organized. I'm Sara in that scene in Labyrinth with everything on my back but unable to leave anything behind. 

So the first reaction isn't the poem. 

Hoping you and yours have a remarkable 2019 and that the journey leads you to a good vantage point for 2020 and onward. Thanks for being part of this blog and thanks to those at Poets United and The Sunday Muse for the inspiration--the breath--for this blog.

Best wishes,

Chrissa

Yep, photobombed my own photo. We went out on my birthday to look at lights in Prestonwood, a wonderful neighborhood for light viewing if you're to the north of Houston. Very grateful to all those families, who work to give this gift, despite clogged streets, every year. Happy New Year!