January is a pause, a breath exhaled, 
A white candle lit on a foggy morning.
A time to look back in reflection and 
A time to look forward in anticipation.
After the buzzing holiday season full of sensory input and
People,
January makes no claim or expectation.
A simple quiet hush falls over the calendar.
Though a new year has begun, it’s grandeur
Begins small
With soft threads just starting to come together
To touch, to weave in and out 
To grow by degrees into a tapestry envisioned.
Time is a construct we created to help us make sense of life.
Its cyclical spiral bringing us, yet again, back to the original position,
Another trip around the sun.
And yet, it holds meaning, if we let it.
What questions whisper in the soft folds of a gentle January?
What arrows show the contours of who you are becoming?
You are free to rest, dear heart.
Lean back into the strong arms of love and hope holding you.
January is a mirror, reflecting your image, showing you your life.
Be kind to your past self. 
Be patient with your present self.
Be gentle towards your future self.
You have inhabited January many times. 
Don’t miss the beauty of it. 
Looking back and looking forward at the same time 

They fly
Overhead
And I look up
To see their vee-shaped 
Migration to the south

Their honking, haunting calls
Pierce this modern life and
Tie me back and back and back 
To all the peoples who have come before

The geese keep flying their routes
The circular spiral of seasons turning,
Spinning with the globe as it whirls around the sun.
The autumns and springs always come ‘round.

This echoic memory embeds itself
Into my story.
Just as the song of spring peepers 
Transports me, suddenly, surprisingly, but happily
To a green holler in 
West Virginia

I lift my eyes to watch the geese
And smile 
I whisper on the inside,
“I’m glad I live in a place where 
Geese fly overhead.”