New Year Poem

Bob, , , 
Ghosts come in from the sea
Leaving footprints just above the ground 

That only the wind remembers.

Frantic the city poet
An orange traffic cone for a wand 

Leaps like a librarian through the dewy grass.

The moon an avid documentarian 
As solemn as a whimsy spring afternoon

In a landscape of green ideas.

And if I may 
Also add
How often 
Rivers are
Dreams are 
Each other.

30 thoughts on “New Year Poem”

  1. I love the eerie, unsettling imagery of this poem: the ghosts coming in from the sea, leaving footprints just above the ground. What a startling painting this would make ; and that city poet, unhinged and whimsical —

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  2. As johnmalone pointed out, the eeriness of the ghost coming from the sea kicks this off with a bang and then them footprints floating like manna in the desert. Hell Yeh. I love me a little magic and ain’t just about everything magic and we miss it; we don’t see it, most of the time anyway, in my experience, but the “wind remembers.” And I musta done something wrong because I was out walking for two hours today and that wind was a bitch, paying me back for something. HA!

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    1. Thanks Steve. I tried walking today too. The wind was biting cold. So didn’t make it as far as I liked. I guess the wind remembered all my past misdeeds as well. I’m glad you liked the magic. I think we need some of that as well.

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      1. I finally figured out the right clothes combo to deal with the wind and cold. A lot of layers because I don’t have a good jacket with the right animal feathers, but it’s good enough.

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      2. I know me, I’ll by on Youtube later looking up the best way to dress for the winter and cold wind. I’m glad you found the right combo. There are times being out in the snow and cold is really nice.

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      3. That’s exactly how I felt today while walking outside – “nice” and surprised i was feeling nice, but then i realized it was less windy than yesterday. I might just say fuck it and buy a good winter jacket.

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      5. I don’t remember if we talked about this so sorry in advance if I’m repeating myself. I recently went on a Richard Linklater marathon and watched as many of his movies that I could find. I had never seen BOYHOOD. What a wonderful movie and as is often the case with new movies – new music. That band FAMILY OF THE YEAR has some beautiful vocals.

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      6. I have been meaning to watch Boyhood. Funny, I brought up Slacker earlier today. I’m going to put Boyhood on my to watch list. Now that’s it’s so cold, I want to get as many movies in as I can. I just looked up Family of the Year, and the first video had Boyhood footage. I’m going to look up more now.

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      7. I’m kind of biased because to me Linklater is a genius of movies, but anyway, FAMILY OF THE YEAR song in Boyhood had me so damn excited at the greatness of their vocals and there are some boring pop songs they have but a few are tremendous on acoustic and vocals, in my opinion anyway.

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    1. Thanks Sunra. The special atmosphere is really nice of you to say. I struggled with the end. It is supposed to be “are” …Both rivers and dreams are each other. I think I’ll circle back to this at some point and see if I can make it more clear.

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      1. Ah, I see! Please don’t feel the need to change anything on my account. I was just curious. If I say it to myself like:

        “rivers are dreams,
        are each other”

        then it makes sense. In a way, because it’s a river, you could write the whole thing as one sentence, as a river would run. But that might take away from the meaning, unless you put the comma after “dreams.”

        It’s funny cos I did a poetry workshop recently where we talked about the power of punctuation, and how some poets uses a line break instead of a comma, or just to create a pause in thought. So the ending of your poem got me thinking. Anyway, I’m over thinking now! So I’ll stop 😄

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      2. I like your suggestions. And will probably make the changes. Thanks! It’s funny about punctuation, and I’ll have to agree about the power of punctuation. Sometimes I can debate what seems like the littlest things, like should I use a comma or period or nothing at all.

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  6. Fantastic image of the hovering footprints in the second line. Since the ghosts come out of the sea, I’m guessing their footprints are water drops, which for me is echoed at the end with dreamy rivers. A neat poem 🌞

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  8. This feels like a glorious fragment fallen from a most surreal carnival. Maybe an album cover. And I certainly agree that rivers are dreams are rivers are dreams! Great thought to be washed away on.

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