We went outside
in bitter bitter cold
the other night
to ring in a new year
108 times
on the big bell.

In shivering silence
we watched each other
take up the hammer,
strike iron,

and echo out into the world
our losses,
our pain,
and our struggle.

Sometimes there's this sense
that washes me away
into the current of the universe.

And just so long,
as I don't faint heartedly step back
from the edge
of nothingness,

everything becomes
what it always is anyway,

as the person
I think I am
merges quietly
with the sound of the bell,

and floats effortlessly away
across that dark frozen valley
there
in
the
night.