After New Year’s Eve
Already gone the luminaries
of New Year’s Eve that lighted
the curving paths in the park,
the forks to enter or exit.
A chill has settled in,
and silence. A neighbor
lifts the undecorated tree
into his truck, a few kids
straggle over the green.
Here and there a puff
of steam exhales from
a heat vent. At one house
the smell of laundry drifts
over the sidewalk,
reaching out as if we were
all tidying up together.
No one is welcoming
the months to come,
the inevitable discord.
Yet last night in the dark,
the luminaries were so
peaceful as they faintly
flickered promises.
Charlotte Melin grew up in Indiana and returns to visit. Retired from the University of Minnesota, she lives in Northfield and has published widely about German poetry, the environmental humanities, and teaching.