Turning the Calendar (a poem)

 

Turning the Calendar

 

by Alice Jane-Marie Massa

 

 

Turning the calendar

is part of life in print

or life in hard-copy braille.

I suppose some also make

this motion forward

electronically.

Whatever the medium at hand,

January is behind us.

February forms ahead:

like the hope of a new year,

a new month

bolsters whatever hope remains

from the roller-coaster ride

of the just past thirty-one days.

 

Turning the calendar,

do I make a new resolution or two,

do I measure the ones made

as fulfilled or now foolish?

Am I grateful

that this new winter month

has only twenty-eight days?

Are you?

 

Turning the calendar,

I wonder what wishes

I will make for these fresh, four weeks–

what unwanted worries

will weave their ways

into the symmetrical squares

of this calendar’s second page.

 

Turning the calendar,

the page that flips over

contains the calligraphy

of worries and memories;

but some worries have a stubborn way

of pushing their prongs

into each present day.

Am I forever

Alice in Worry-land?

 

Only one more turn of the calendar–

off to Springtime!

Then, I will worry

no more–

no more than needed.

How I have stacked up

all of these calendars of worries!

 

Turning the calendar

in twenty-eight days,

I resolve to reach

toward Spring

and step at least

one ruby slipper

away from

Alice in Worry-land.

 

 

Happy February!  Happy Turning the Calendar!

Alice and Willow

 

February 1, 2017, Wednesday

 

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