New Year’s Eve
and the clatter of suitcase handles
defying the quiet car
concerning the woman in the seat beside me
silently screaming
into her teeth.
Pop! Pop! The train is under attack
the assault we fled from our point of origin follows us as
chaos kids chuck
firecrackers on the rails,
new worries, same as old and
further furrowing the silent screamer.
The air is must, jacketed bodies still heaving
from the sprint to catch the train
now sweating in repose and slipping off their winter shells and
no one is comfortable
so you know we must be traveling.
Someone cracks a window to combat the stale air,
sliced bread eaten plain & crumbs crumble the floor
furrowing brows yet further.
We’re all going somewhere
as our minds trace where we’re coming from
collectively and silently screaming
“THIS YEAR WILL BE DIFFERENT”
and most of us now sporting
furrowed brows
as the train pulls us inevitably forward
towards the future.

1. Sometimes your heart rate rivals that of a racehorse— remember that you’re not in a race. Breathe slower; think slower. The world moves fast enough.
2. You were not born to carry the world on your shoulders.
3. Everything happens for a reason— there is a divine plan in place. If you look closely, you can see the borders of the puzzle. You can see each piece settling into its place. Know that you are also settling into your place, even if the whole picture hasn’t yet been revealed.
4. Others’ perception of you has very little to actually do with you. It is not your job to be palatable, to be dainty, to be condensable into something bite-size and picturesque. If they cannot fathom your magnitude, it is not for them to fathom.
5. Distance really does make the heart grow fonder.
6. “Do small things with great love.”
7. Words lacking purpose seldom make their way into our collective consciousness; cliches are cliches for a reason. Listen to them.
8. Every word in a sentence has a purpose. Every sentence in a phrase has a purpose. Everything has a purpose. Pay attention to it all.
9. “There is no fear in love.”
10. Infinities are made up of individual moments. Moments are made up of individual infinities. Cherish it all, the big and the small.
11. Don’t let fear destroy relationships. Speak with intention. It shows that you listen. It shows that you care.
12. Be the shoulder your thirteen-year-old self needed to cry on. She is gone, but there are so many just like her. Care for them, as you would yourself. Care more.
13. Good company makes bad food taste a little better. Good people make the life you live a little sweeter.
14. Sometimes you need to look people in the eyes and tell them you love them. It matters more than you know.
15. Others will not always afford you the same compassion you afford them. You are not responsible for how others treat you. You are responsible for how you treat them.
16. Everyone deserves kindness.
17. Anger can be productive, but don’t sit in it too long. Take a small weekend trip into the fury, but once the time is up, give it a kiss on the cheek and a quick wave and make your exit. You do not want to live in the rage; pay a visit and learn a thing or two, then pack your bags and say goodbye. You have better places to be.
18. Vulnerability is power.
19. Every moment is infinitely important. Don’t wake up one day and wonder if your best days are behind you; they are always ahead. Time waits for no one, and you shouldn’t want it to.

Happy new year.
I wish you the best,
For the year ahead.
I hope the year is full of bliss,
Full of joy.

I hope you find love,
I hope you find the one.
I pray you find happiness,
And all you have ever wished for.

May this year be the best,
Of all the years you have lived.
And may it be the first,
Of many more years to come.

I want to greet the new year
with 20/20 eyes,
knowing that cure dances
on the edge of hope’s grave
and that in this biblical year
of flood, cancer and death
that grief is just a
short term companion.

Tomorrow time
will step me away,
leaving only memory
and the long walk
to the horizon.

Dear Diary;
this year already
tastes like last year
and I can see the
rot ahead.

the first steps felt so easy.
i was unburdened.
at times i flew.

it took me all these years to find
that everything inside me
had never changed at all