A New Year's Poem

A New Year's Poem

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light;
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow;
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rimes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

--Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892), Poet Laureate of Great Britain for much of Victoria's reign

Burning the Old Year

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.

--Naomi Shihab Nye (1952- ), Ferguson-born Palestinian-American poet, from Words Under the Words: Selected Poems, 1995

The Birthday of the World

On the birthday of the world
I begin to contemplate
what I have done and left
undone, but this year
not so much rebuilding

of my perennially damaged
psyche, shoring up eroding
friendships, digging out
stumps of old resentments
that refuse to rot on their own.

No, this year I want to call
myself to task for what
I have done and not done
for peace. How much have
I dared in opposition?

How much have I put
on the line for freedom?
For mine and others?
As these freedoms are pared,
sliced and diced, where

have I spoken out? Who
have I tried to move? In
this holy season, I stand
self-convicted of sloth
in a time when lies choke

the mind and rhetoric
bends reason to slithering
choking pythons. Here
I stand before the gates
opening, the fire dazzling

my eyes, and as I approach
what judges me, I judge
myself. Give me weapons
of minute destruction. Let
my words turn into sparks.


--Marge Piercy (1936- ), Jewish American poet, author, and activist, from The Crooked Inheritance, 2006.

Posted for Rosh Hashanah, 5781.

After the Gentle Poet Kobayashi Issa

New Year’s morning—
everything is in blossom!
   I feel about average.

   A huge frog and I 
 staring at each other,
   neither of us moves. 

  This moth saw brightness
in a woman’s chamber—
   burned to a crisp.

   Asked how old he was
the boy in the new kimono
   stretched out all five fingers.

   Blossoms at night,
like people
   moved by music

   Napped half the day;
no one
   punished me!

Fiftieth birthday:

   From now on,
It’s all clear profit
   every sky.

   Don’t worry, spiders,
I keep house
   casually.

  These sea slugs,
they just don’t seem
  Japanese.

Hell:

   Bright autumn moon;
pond snails crying
   in the saucepan.

--Robert Hass (1941- ), American poet and US Poet Laureate 1995-1997, from Field Guide, 1973.

(not shutting up)

not shutting up

New Year morning's late riser...

the crow

--Kobayashi Issa, (1763-1828), Japanese poet, haiku master, and lay Zen priest, translated by Daniel Lanoue, written in 1811

.だまつても行ぬやけさの遅烏
damatte mo yukanu ya kesa no oso karasu

(from the storehouse)

from the storehouse

shining slantwise...

year's first sun

--Kobayashi Issa (1763-1828), Japanese poet and haiku master, written 1811, translated by David G. Lanoue

.土蔵からすじかいにさすはつ日哉
dozô kara sujikai ni sasu hatsu hi kana

Burning the Old Year

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.

--Naomi Shihab Nye (1952- ), Palestinian-American St.  Louis-born poet, from Words Under the Words: Selected Poems, 1995.

Prayer for New Year's Day

Holy One,

Creator, Sustainer, Redeemer,

we give you thanks for your great faithfulness,

for your tender compassion and abundant grace

that bears us up in contentment and gratitude.

Your mercies are new every morning:

your protecting, guiding hand leads us into hope,

that we may look back and remember your goodness

and look forward in hope for the gift of this new year.

You are making the heavens and the earth:

remake in us our innocence and joy

that we may see the delights you spread before us

and give thanks for your ongoing creation within us.

May we open our hearts to your abundance

and embody your healing hands in the world,

that reconciliation and peace may flourish in your Name.

God of Grace,

extend the awning of your mercy

over all who cry out to You,

and place the seal of your blessing

upon those for whom we pray.

Amen.

-- Leslie Scoopmire, January 1, 2019

Scots blessing for a new year

God, bless to me the new day,
Never vouchsafed to me before;
It is to bless your own presence
You have given me this time, O God.

Bless to my eye,
May my eye bless all it sees;
I will bless my neighbor,
May my neighbor bless me.

God, give me a clean heart,
Let me not from sight of your eye;
Bless to me my family,
And bless to me my means.

--prayer from the Scottish Highlands, collected by Alexander Carmichael (1832-1912) and published in Carmina Gadelica