by Ron Jevaltas

 

Wind Born Chaff (Auld Lang Syne)

30, 31:

two small bearings in the eyes of

a tiger listening

 

to the warm while the 

world’s gone viral. Pine faggot,

iridescent in

 

its nascent checking,

speaks. And they’ll real out the year

in a montage of

 

sound bites and fleeting

images. And I’m supposed

to wax nostalgic

 

and rheumy eyed. The

more things change the more they stay

the same. It growls as

 

it hungrily scans

the cold. I adjust flaming

logs to hold more. Blue,

 

tinted yellow, licks

the Pyrex as I close this

box of Cracker Jacks.

 

Vvv

 

I came , I saw, I

conquered. That basket of sweets

in the faculty

room , my Rubicon. An

old man, bent on relevance,

encircled by the

guffaws of 40

sophomores unwittingly

searching for Brutus,

endures. The only

thing that’s changed in 50+

years is me. A life-

time of one campaign

after another –

just this battle left.

 

verge of sugaring

 

faux spring is a soft

wet kiss on the cheek of a

winter thats grown old

 

belickened they strut

crusted snow with a mountains 

patience we envy

 

little harkens but

highway croon and pawl snick of

pregnant gutter drops

 

pan held islands of

snow melts away last years grime

steam in rehearsal

 

blackened yet unspent

doused birch poles share more than

acrid confluence

 

twin doors now swing clear 

cabin portal to vying 

but lovely seasons

 

and we accustomed

to each other’s rough edges 

find our locked hands smoothed