Christmas Songs
I listen to those Christmas songs
playing in the doctor’s office
in the stale days before the new year breaks.
Let’s have done with frenzy, ribbons and the miles
between then and now, between them and now.
The year sags, the hammock of winter
holds aching bones, curved spine.
I can think only of champagne catching the tree lights
through the Millennium goblets I bought in Ireland
it seems a thousand years ago.
The sparkling wine rushes the forehead
to welcome the new days.
Children’s voices move away,
piano keys grow silent, suitcases are packed full.
Do we ever stay?
The new daylight goes unnoticed.
The swimming pool lies under its moldy, canvas top.
Faded poinsettia leaves, brown over white,
struggle into a February that sees
roses bend their necked stems in silent death throes.
Did I just hear another Christmas carol
pressed like a dead petal within a television jingle?
Why don’t we let it go?
A little girl, a stranger,
now strikes the keys of my family piano
that I had to leave behind.
I saw the piano move down an angled plank
and up another into the van,
Was my mother watching also?
The years of Christmas carols
trailed behind, as the truck
moved down the summer road.