Day Four

Red Giants

Planetary Nebula NGC 2392, Astronomy Magazine

 

I let go in January,

After boxes were packed away
Hiding the facade of hope
From jubilant times once full of promise.

I dismissed it and it slipped
through my fingers,
Like those who stole away
Through the veil.

Again, and again, and again.

And, once again, as one remembered
in a year gone by.

Eliot was wrong.
It is January’s bitter.

Stinging nights keep watch as the moon sleeps dark and stars burn
so hot they snuff themselves to blink out of sight without a hint
of goodbye, if one isn’t watchful.

It was in January, the cruelest month,
I let go of promise and dreams
along a trail of dying stars.

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Author’s Note:

Today’s prompt from NaPoWriMo

“And now, for our (optional) prompt. In his poem “The Wasteland,” T.S. Eliot famously declared that “April is the cruelest month.” But is it? I’d have thought February. Today I challenge you to write a poem in which you explore what you think is the cruelest month, and why. Perhaps it’s September, because kids have to go back to school. Or January, because the holidays are over and now you’re up to your neck in snow. Or maybe it’s a month most people wouldn’t think of (like April), but which you think of because of something that’s happened in your life. Happy (or, if not happy, not-too-cruel) writing!”