Hello poets, friends and followers.

1 January 1965
By Joseph Brodsky

The Wise Men will unlearn your name.
Above your head no star will flame.
One weary sound will be the same—
the hoarse roar of the gale.
The shadows fall from your tired eyes
as your lone bedside candle dies,
for here the calendar breeds nights
till stores of candles fail.

What prompts this melancholy key?
A long familiar melody.
It sounds again. So let it be.
Let it sound from this night.
Let it sound in my hour of death—
as gratefulness of eyes and lips
for that which sometimes makes us lift
our gaze to the far sky.

You glare in silence at the wall.
Your stocking gapes: no gifts at all.
It’s clear that you are now too old
to trust in good Saint Nick;
that it’s too late for miracles.
—But suddenly, lifting your eyes
to heaven’s light, you realize:
your life is a sheer gift.

Last year is not going to history as the greatest years for humanity. But now we have turned pages to the next year.

Today we are opening up again. The dust from last year has been cleaned, the pumps are polished and there are fresh candles burning. It’s a wonderful feeling to start on a new note-book, waiting for all those unwritten lines that are still just seeds waiting to germinate. We are eager to see what you will write. We are here to support and inspire you, and there will be some news coming up during the year to come. There will be new voices behind the bar, there will be fresh faces coming here eager to present their poetry.

We have had some talks about changes behind the scenes, and we have decided to have more occasions to link up. Monday will become a prompt-day and we will expand on the haibun Monday to have it more frequently. On Monday January 18 we will have the premiere of a new recurring challenge.

Check out d’Schedule for a little more info.

But now tell me: Do you have any budding ideas on how to fill those empty notebooks with poignant ink?