Until next time

Time to march towards next year.
I was waiting to begin, as I always do.
And now the wait is over, and such
is my great privilege.
I heard on the radio that some
do not march toward the next year,
live only in the present, and that
is the wedge against happiness.
Isn't it funny, the appeal
of deprivation.
Well, I'll tell you what
it makes me mad!
To think a life could be so hard
that one might not have the room
to say "this year blank verse but
next year, finally, a villanelle!"
I heard this on the radio,
such horror, and here I am
becoming middle-aged. Or not? Well,
I experience changes at last,
and see the gift in it,
and wish it for all my kin
and all their kin, and all
they've ever known or seen
forever, and ever, Amen.