(Ed note: Happy New Year to All! And although we have been up every day for several months, it is still a joy to announce our grand opening. Today we start the year with a wonder bit of work by Christopher J Ananias, who is also responsible for the header image–Leila)

from the bug eyes of isolation

put the trailer court into a paper sack

and drink it

thirty years of days, gone

classmates, like pickets

they want, (they say), to see me at the class reunion

an October affair

when the pink glories despair

I can’t recall their faces

no one to dismiss

surely they had the makings of which

hair lips teeth—smiles and such

no successful accolades

What can I give?

they don’t want to catch my limp

one more look over the yearbook

oh, heart jumping!

there’s Lori’s brown braids

and Ken’s grin

he passed the pot pipe—and more

frozen people on wooden bleachers

others marching with golden horns and blue pennants!

cheerleaders throwing stars!

teachers standing around

oh sadness!

what do they want with me?

I cannot face those faces

I’m on a suspended license

riding up in my junker with dog hairs

gray goatee and brown eyes, dodging

with a shuffling hunching

mortal coil nearly shucking

all these days of years, drinking

leaking me on the barroom’s floor

a living hole

should take a big step through yon skyward’s door

no kids’ picture to present

not even a surly seed

or his mother’s needs

just me

drinking foghorns of time

sleeping on cement slabs

bars and paper crosses

glued with mint toothpaste

Who could believe?

we were ever seventeen

bursting threads and heart seams

marching with golden horns and blue pennants!

one more look over the yearbook