maybe '14 wasn't so great,
maybe indeed,
it was just
******* awful,
a year out of sequence,
come fifty, seventy years too soon.

here I am
alone at home,
laying about,
and A riddler wishes
me a marvelous holiday,
a merry Christmas,
interrupting my umpty umpth
viewing of Ralph's seasonal quest
for a Red Ryder BB gun

another poem, gestating,
suddenly borning,
kicking my guts
get out here and now,
nine months, of nine minutes are up

another story,
needy for retelling,
another riddle to unravel,
another itch, this day is now stuck on
a poetry assignment, way way too big,
high school football and a good novel,
put far aside and from a
watery weeping state,
here he goes...

ain't no hiding this day,
ain't exactly mine,
a nice Jewish boy,
from the skyscraper city,
brine bred on family lore,
that starts with an escape journey
from the Spanish Inquisitors
some five hundred some years ago  

clueless where to take this travail,
absent answers, questions unanswered,
why do I do this to myself,
looking once again
at the places where pain
comes from,
knowing that my human answers
just a salve of paper thin digital words

how to crossover,
from distressed days
to peace on earth,
when  I ain't got
no talking relationship
with Jesus on an
average bad day,
let alone his manger birthday

this year was not my best neither,
double negatives purposeful employed,
but my bad ain't even close,
to answering riddles and questions
taken as my very own,
making a bad year
that much worse

head butting,
no answers coming,
when my own spirit in the sky,
does it again,
via Pandora,
plays another
nice Jewish boy's answer
to my dilemma,
as if my mind read,
Norman Greenbaum sings his answer
from way back in
1969

well my prayer
sorta exactly answered,
whom am I to disbelieve,
here's another tribe member wrestling
with the exact same interrogatory,
invoking Jesus's intervention
one that sold millions of copies,
to ever question the
unfathomable wisdom of
the spirit in the sky

but my work made even easier,
the question riddler
clues me in
with her answer simple,
and unafraid:

"celebrate the present
and
remember the missing
then celebrate both together"

there is no divide here,
no north, no south,
call your spirit by whatever name,
and
where your story begins,
how it ends,
it's your own poem~composition,
mostly writ,
but not all,
by you,
that cannot be forgot,
for all humans are poems,
past and present
are forever

when at a loss
for the salve of digital words,
well remember Abraham told his only son
some plain words:

"the spirit in the sky,
will provide"

celebrate our portion,
larger or smaller
for are we not family,
one family,
one portion

Riddle solved

-----------------------------------------------
Norman Greenbaum - Spirit In The Sky Lyrics |1969

"When I die and they lay me to rest
Gonna go to the place that's the best
When I lay me down to die
Goin' up to the spirit in the sky

Goin' up to the spirit in the sky
That's where I'm gonna go when I die
When I die and they lay me to rest
Gonna go to the place that's the best
Prepare yourself, you know it's a must

Gotta have a friend in Jesus
So you know that when you die
He's gonna recommend you to the spirit in the sky

Gonna recommend you to the spirit in the sky
That's where you're gonna go when you die
When you die and they lay you to rest
You're gonna go to the place that's the best

Never been a sinner, I never sinned
I got a friend in Jesus
So you know that when I die
He's gonna set me up with the spirit in the sky

Oh, set me up with the spirit in the sky
That's where I'm gonna go when I die
When I die and they lay me to rest
I'm gonna go to the place that's the best
Go to the place that's the best"