POETRY FRIDAY: Burning the Old Year

I had promised myself that I would send out some of my poetry manuscripts in 2007. I never got around to it. I received a lot of sad news about friends and family in the past year. One of my closest friends and two of my first cousins were diagnosed with cancer. A good friend, a dear uncle, and the daughter of one of my best friends passed away. Worry and sadness can wear a hole in one’s ability to concentrate on reading and creative writing…and tending, in a regular organized fashion, to things that must get done. At least, that is what I found.

I can’t say I that I accomplished what I had hoped to accomplish in the last twelve months. I guess the only writing I have to show for the year 2007 is my solo blog, Wild Rose Reader. Sometimes I wrote for my blog when I should have been doing other things. Oh, well! Now that a new year will soon be upon us, I guess it’s time for me to think about sweeping out the old one and beginning afresh with a plan for 2008—the Year of the Rat!

Naomi Shihab Nye is one of my favorite poets. (Her book Red Suitcase is one of my favorite books of adult poetry.) For the last Poetry Friday of 2007, I have selected a poem by Nye that speaks to my feelings about my lack of productivity. I hope the coming year will bring better tidings for so many of the people I care about. I hope, too, that at this time next December, I will be able to look back at the year that has passed and savior a feeling of accomplishment.


BURNING THE OLD 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.

Click here to read the rest of the poem.

I have an original poem entitled Winter Ballet at Wild Rose Reader today.

The Poetry Friday Roundup is at Check It Out this week.

Happy New Year to you all!