Welcome to the Museum of Unfulfilled Dreams…

But before we begin our tour, I see many of you are carrying Unfulfilled Dreams you wish to donate. Please leave them with our Acquisitions Curator, Miss Havisham.

Although we can’t guarantee they will be added to the collection, by signing the paperwork releasing them into our care you become eligible to trade those dreams for more practical plans such as working toward a financially sound retirement.

Now, follow me.

Our first stop is the Hall of Not-Quite-Flight.

Recognize the pair of balding wings in the first case?

That’s right. Icarus. I’m sure what gave it away was the residue of wax where the wings once attached to the boy’s shoulders.

You will find his father, Dedalus, featured in the Hall of Failed Parental Dreams, but moving right along…

On our right you will see two boards nailed together. No, it is not a cross. It is young Ray Faass’s airplane, tested by straddling the plane and heel-shoving it out of the hayloft resulting in bruises and a family story that would not go away–which is not bad by Icarus standards.

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Good dog.

We knew what we were looking for.

Another Australian Cattle dog like Moo.

Moo was the dog brought home by our daughter, Josie, who volunteered at the animal shelter.

Moo put her paws on Josie’s shoulders, stared into her eyes and said, “Get me out of here.”Maybe no one else heard it, but Josie did.

And we needed a dog, not at our house where we had a resident dachshund who owned the place, but for my dad who lived alone six months out of the year in New Jersey between winters spent across the street from us here in Tallahassee.

A phone call during those long summer months was answered by a voice rusty with disuse. The man needed a dog!

The old year sat on the curb…

beside last year’s favorite toy,

discarded, wheels-up.

And a Christmas tree forlorn with tinsel.

And the cardboard carton from some

must-have gizmo.

 

The ribbon across the old year’s chest,

so festive when champagne bottles

blew their corks

was tattered now.

2015 it read.

* 

I’m one for the history books,

the old year thought,

responsible for bellicose shouts that

drowned the gunshot-crack of

glaciers calving into a

too-warm sea,

and the smug hatred of they’re-not-us,

and mass migrations

of suffering.

* 

But some grace too,

the old year thought.

Of babies born and trees planted.

Of truth spoken and shelter given. 

He was smiling over spring’s

remembered flowers when

The limo rolled up.

*

2016

Arriving in style.

A little tipsy and way too 

cock-sure.

* 

The old year sat slouched 

like a panhandling bum

as the new year

strutted by

ignoring the old year’s

benediction:

*

“Good luck, fella.

Good luck.”