Old Year’s Day draws to its close

Raucous room pressed full in warm-faced embrace

Separate and alone propped against beer-soaked oak

He is found lost in the crowd’s refrains

Resonating in silence his disconnected pain.

Jovial masquerade acts on in stupor

Group-laugh passes by on curve of crescendo

then wanes and fades into the future.

Obituary of another year passed

Penned in his head un-rhymed and mis-timed

As he sits in sad solitude, whiskey un-iced

Lost in the mayhem, free from the bind

A silent observer of his own once removed lie.

Discordant voices break, late, in drunken tones

‘Old acquaintance be forgot, never brought to mind’

His absent presence, brought to no-ones.

Count of the night ends still, sudden bolted steel

Jarred behind him as he turns to pass-by

Feet moving forward to another countless sleep

As he slips unseen through the masses

His tightened chest tender-torn, as unspoken glass

Refrain breaks in rendition from revellers last

The resounding wave of tormenting merriment

Dissipates to distance, lost to the past

Tripping movements of the merry dance onward

the New Year’s promise to befriend.

Aching souls of the lonely drift inward

as Old Year’s Day draws to end.

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