Days of Awe

Toothed winds rasp the jetty,

casting off the season’s last leaves

as huddled masses cast breadcrumbs

to the current, making their amends.

Am I meant to be sorry I survived

the year on ethanol and grit,

lit my mind like a torch

and reveled in the burn?

For nights I shunned sleep

for the water's fathomless black,

wading into the star-pocked lake

caught between sink and swim?

For every bruise that bloomed

on my knuckles, the fist-sized gap

I left in the plaster, one stud looming

white as a rib through the dark?

The lake surges in fits and starts,

men in somber suits, women’s skirts

whirled like cyclones in the gale.

Over and over they hurl

sins to the slavering waves,

forsaking their daily bread,

letting hunger make them holy.

But I have never found atonement

in this hollowness, only a reminder

that there’s room enough for

the breadcrumbs of a new year.

I will gather them in fistfuls.

I will eat the whole damn loaf.