Burning the Old Year – Naomi Shihab Nye


Letters swallow themselves in seconds.
Notes friends tied to the doorknob,
transparent scarlet paper,
sizzle like moth wings,
marry the air.

So much of any year is flammable,
lists of vegetables, partial poems.
Orange swirling flame of days,
so little is a stone.

Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,
an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.
I begin again with the smallest numbers.

Quick dance, shuffle of losses and leaves,
only the things I didn’t do
crackle after the blazing dies.

What I interpreted was that many things can disappear fast, the poet uses the term fire in a way that is that all things leave or can be destroyed easily. After physical things leave you only have yourself and your memories.

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