New Year’s Eve

And let us dream of how it might have been
and how it might still be if fate allows
time still to dream, and perhaps to believe.

The old ladies who are
well acquainted with grief.

In shadowed dusk they
potter round the house in familiar gloves
remembering how she blushed
when he teased her
remembering how he held her hand
the first touch
of their fifty years of love.

And the children stumbling home
arm in arm
after the first intimacy.

A hurried kiss
cheeks emboldened by the rime
or by the hoar frost
their faces alive
with possibility.