New Year

Poem 826 – For the Innocent of Iran

/ BenDQ / Leave a comment

The days are light and spring is here.
Winter now seems a distant coup
and so I was confused when you
proclaimed with joy, Happy New Year.

Nowruz Mobarak, ‘happy new day!’
On hearing playful birds’ fresh tunes
and admiring the new born blooms,
the penny dropped, it’s more sense this way.

And so I wish you hope this instant.
Whichever start you mark, I pray
that amongst the shelling you may stay
faithful, and find there hope persistent.

It’s the Iranian New Year today, or so I learnt from my new Iranian friend at our Conversation Cafe. My prayers are with his family and the ordinary people of Iran, those caught up in a war inflicted upon them by those in power.
(20.03.26)

© Ben Quant 2026
Photo by Chris Linnett on Unsplash

Poem 64 – Aladdin’s New Year

/ BenDQ / Leave a comment

The chimes of Big Ben ring as midnight turns
A sorcerer ushering in the year
Calling new lamps for old as in the tale
But can the past be ever truly left
Behind or does it haunt our every step
A shadow shading, or whisper shaping
The present intersected by the past
Two conjoined twins inseparable from birth
And so give thanks for what has been, for that
Has made you who you are and who you’re yet to be

Over the last two New Years we’ve wished for better ones to come, but regardless of what they’ve been like, these years are now part of us.
(01.01.22)

© Ben Quant 2022