As the saying goes, "I don't know where this came from!" A result of all that I have been reading, I guess. I have had a very special 2009 in many ways and, although not unaware of the on-going challenges our "global village" faces, am resolved to being and doing what I can where I am in 2010. Now there's less than 17 minutes left of the Noughties in Dorset this evening; I hope for each one of you what it is you wish for yourselves in the coming year and decade ahead - and especially that you stay safe and well. New Year hugs and kisses, Kate xx

YEAR’S ESTUARY


Each moment ripens
another bruise:
the old year is dying;

leaving behind its stagnant pools
and eddies of brambled laughter,
it has nothing more to live for.

Another year drunk on swollen
love and incubated hatred,
daily corpses blossomed
in its florid undertow.

Silence, like blowflies,
already invades it, its dreams
a shipwrecked paradise,
a death-row morning star.

Worm-like it writhes still
with every passing bend;
ouroborous its beginning
swallows up its end;

Orphaned, homeless,
everywhere in exile,
a lost thing returning:

its chill-warmth ebbs now
suddenly.