Burnt-out Ends of Smoky Days: Goodbye 2009

Ah Poverties, Wincings, and Sulky Retreats
by Walt Whitman

Ah, poverties, wincings, and sulky retreats,
Ah you foes that in conflict have overcome me,
(For what is my life or any man’s life but a conflict with foes, the old, the incessant war?)
You degradations, you tussle with passions and appetites,
You smarts from dissatisfied friendships, (ah wounds the sharpest of all!)
You toil of painful and choked articulations, you meannesses,
You shallow tongue-talks at tables, (my tongue the shallowest of any;)
You broken resolutions, you racking angers, you smother’d ennuis!
Ah think not you finally triumph, my real self has yet to come forth,
It shall yet march forth o’ermastering, till all lies beneath me,
It shall yet stand up the soldier of ultimate victory.

Ah, it seems that Mr. Whitman has got our number — we’re half in and half out with 2009 — bemoaning the tarnished glory of what was going to be a wonderful year, and, inadvisedly optimistic, relentlessly hopeful, looking toward the new and unblemished 2010. Here’s to our “real self” stepping out from behind pettiness and meanness and “o’ermastering” our tendency to sulk and retreat.

Onward.

Roll on, 2010. Happy New Year, guys.