Brian Fink invited an all-star lineup of poets to end 2020 with a little “poetry salvo.” By a slip of the thumb, he included me on the list. This was my entry.
pridie kalends The masses do not mourn the passing year. As if a calendar could circumscribe their suffering, they celebrate and cheer this orbit’s end (and heavily imbibe). Our planet now returns to take its place by Two-Faced Janus (though I’m told that’s wrong— it’s savage Juno’s month. Her only face is cruel and unappeased by drink or song). Like Sisyphus’s boulder, we spin back to where we started, only to begin our plodding pace around our starry track, until we make our homeward turn again, those lesser gods, each time- and season-bound, mere passengers with us on this great round.