December's Bridge To January Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

It's a viaduct built over
hurdles of land
across overflooded
lakes and swamps

that must not
drown us
into bubbling mush
of ourselves
in life's cauldron.

Before we fly
with preened January's wings,
a crowing bird,
into the unknown land.

O New Year, your wings
flipped out
to full albatross
cruising wingspan

to flap along with us
to the island
of earth's
nobody wants to miss,

when breezes
and winds blow
with tick tocks on rails.

Let the speed train
not leave us behind,
as I roll over
pillows in a broken
abandoned locomotive,

all passengers
having fled
to catch the next
rumbling train

wriggling across hills
and mountains
to the tallest baobab tree
of the New Year,

its eve sticking out
dry brittle branches
I must grip
to climb to the terraced land.

(ii)

Over there, the sun-lit
land of dawn
ploughed and mulched
by wishes
from a beggar's horse

with little steam
to gallop and canter
up to the gates
of the year, another tree.

In its glowing branches,
the thorny tree
carries gold fruits
I can grab only crab hands
from an arsenal
of tools built into me,

as I fly, hammer
and nail in hand,
to the Year's door steps.

when a night's stiff stretch
into night breaks
Sirius' streaks of light
into a sable-tawny night
darkening into a pitch staircase.

(iii)

On a whispering aqueduct,
as I roll over my bed
onto the rails of a viaduct,
a voice warning me

of a boulder rolling downhill
from my splitting pillows
to cut me off from a galloping day

at a few tick tocks
to midnight's glow
of fireworks from a candle
by life's cradle,

Jesus the Christ of Christmas
by a flickering tree
flipping me into
a corridor of light down

a New Year's hallway, leaves
and flowers sketching 2021
a few unticked tocks after midnight.