i felt 2021 leave
as if i had showed it to the door
and set the lock when it left.
felt the weight leave my chest
as i looked to the sky,
the fireworks bursting over the trees
of another neighborhood.
i could feel the arms of a ghost
wrapped around my shoulders as we watched.
not an echo of the past
but a promise for the future, for 2022.
like lines waiting to be colored in.
usually, when the time comes,
i don’t feel the change.
the years just drift off into
an abandoned corner of my house
to be stumbled upon in
moments of weakness or
desperation to turn back time.
i am glad to have felt this skin shed,
to give me more room to breath.
the truth is, i had nothing left to give.
no days to be written over or lived in again.
like an animal in a trap,
i have torn through sinew and bone
and made it to air.
though feeling the phantom pain
of what i once was,
i have made up my mind
and i have decided to run.
now, we look towards the newness of midnight,
a clock set to zero.
and so it begins
(again)