As the old year slips

away, what have you learned that’s

worth taking into the new?

~

Years; they come and go

as, in my experience,

do all things, both fair and foul.

NOTHING stays the same

in our stunning Universe.

Bad news for Conservatives.

~

Still, some things are worth

conserving: integrity

 and the earth to name a few. 

With the clock ticking,

our anxiety grows great.

Will we act in time?

~

There is always hope.

That other clock’s been ticking

seventy-five years so far.

What’s this nausea?

Is it a stomach virus,

or is it just politics?

~

It’s a systemic

virus. That we know for sure.

Let’s take the steps for a cure.

The impossible

takes a little longer, but

some of us want it right now.

~

Is it possible,

as we await perfection,

that our wants might change?

Conspicuously

absent in our government;

from whence will three wise men come?

~

This time around we

 should be looking for three wise

women and the gifts they bring.

On this day of His

holy birth, may compassion

at last take root on this earth.

~

Render unto man

all the manly attributes

espoused by the NRA.

Negativity

very rarely yields results

of a positive nature.

~

But what if what you’re

seeking is not addition

but just subtraction?

Could it be that these 

two, Franklin and Lindsey Graham,

are, as the Brits say, crackers?

~

Fissures dating back

to earliest childhood

yield fragmented brittle men.

Sometimes poets just

need to sit and drink a beer

and leave the cap on the pen.

~

While staring at the

froth and foam of existence

inspiration might appear.

 May we find a way

to contribute our gifts to

the well-being of the whole.

~

Collectivist thoughts?

You’d best be careful there girl,

lest the Senate name you Red!

And the dice are cast…

All that remains to be seen

is which numbers will come up.

~

It seems everyone

has his number. The question

is how and why they’ll use it.

Struggling to find

our way in the midst of all

the fret and fury.

~

Gavrilo Princip’s

rash, impertinent action

once touched off a powder keg…

The sound of his voice

has that magical power

to cause all ears to bleed.

~

If it were only

ears that bled, it wouldn’t be

as bad as it has become.

Ever wonder what

the Prince of Peace would make of

our violent ways?

~

If I remember,

the Prince of Peace was heard to

say, “Render unto Caesar…”

If he can’t be Time’s

Person of the Year, he can

 still be Idiot in Chief.

~

When the bigly man’s

trumped by a mere teenage Swede,

any superlative works.

It’s not just earthquakes

that rend this land asunder,

rageful rancor does it too.

~

If we avoided

fracking and fractious debate

quaking would subside.

It’s the twelfth day of

the twelfth month and our leader

acts like a weird twelve year old.

~

Meanwhile, Congress

counts coup in five minute chunks

and Senate sucks their thumbs.

It’s Sixty degrees

with snow forecast by morning.

That’s Virginia in winter.

~

This, in the era

of radical climate change,

has become the new normal.

Be on the lookout.

It’s possible sanity

might make a brief appearance.

~

You’d need keener eyes

than mine, to find the barest shred

among all that murky verbiage!

When people offer

constructive criticism,

some feel unjustly censured.

~

Humility helps

us all to listen and learn,

but it doesn’t come easy.

Seventy seven

years ago today, the one

who gave birth to you was born.

~

Seventy-seven

is the smallest integer

pronounced with five syllables.

Deep in the jungle

of a lifetime’s collection,

what might the descendent’s find?

~

It’s not what they’ll find;

rather, it’s what conclusions

they will draw from their findings.

When the song you sing

has only shrill notes, who can

harmonize with you?

~

Dogs will howl along

with your high pitched keening:

whistles only they can hear.

Merry Christmas, Y’all!

Scrooge hands down the gift of choice;

the poor must choose, heat, or food.

~

He just took Christ out

of Christmas, but will his

 evangelical base care?

Hard not to lose heart

when those in power show none

and we have much to repair.

~

Repair all you want-

if we don’t fix the breakers,

we’re in for endless despair.

People can argue

about the ways and means if,

at least, their goals coincide.

~

Therein lies the rub.

Some act like they have the same

goals, but in truth they do not.

 Every now and then

we catch a glimpse of the light

that abides within.

~

Inner glows are fine,

so long as we have refrained

from ingesting radium…

As the tryptophan

coma begins to subside,

we’ll see what Black Friday wrought.

~

The coma persists

but on Black Friday it’s one

of the walking kind.