I am running into a new year, lucille clifton

i am running into a new year
and the old years blow back
like a wind
that i catch in my hair
like strong fingers like
all my old promises and
it will be hard to let go
of what i said to myself
about myself
when i was sixteen and
twentysix and thirtysix
even thirtysix but
i am running into a new year
and i beg what i love and
i leave to forgive me

—(C) Lucille Clifton, Good Woman: Poems and A Memoir 1969-1980

• What did you say to yourself, about yourself, when you were 16, 26, 36, 46, etc.? What do you now need to let go of? Write about it in your journal.

• What are you willing to forgive yourself for? Take a while to settle in, to allow the emotions to arise, and simply begin to write, starting with the words, I forgive myself…

• Begin a poem, as Lucille Clifton has done, with the words, “i am running into a new year…”