12 Days Poem by Jim Yerman

My birthday is December 31st perhaps that’s why I’ve always been a little unclear
Why we’re so quick to complete an end of the year review before the end of the year.

We’re shown the usual montage all edited into a beautiful and fitting vignette
The only problem I can see...the year isn’t quite over yet!

I saw a 2013 review Thursday: people, news, books, trends and shows.
It made me wonder how can the year be over when we still have 12 days to go?

With 12 days to go it seems premature to complete an end of the year review
I would prefer we wait till 2014 before we bid 2013 adieu.

In 12 days I could receive gold rings, drummers drumming, a partridge in a pear tree,
Yes, think of all the lovely gifts my true love could give to me.

In 12 days there may be peace in the world, a cure for cancer could even be found,
A new book may be published that could alter the cosmos or at the very least, inspire or astound.

In the next 12 days people will fall in love, babies will be born and people will die,
Songs will be created, marriages performed, and new inventions surely will fly,

But all these will be lost in the annals of history. From this news we would have been cheated
Since, in the minds of many,2013 has already been completed.

If something momentous occurs in the next 12 days is there any way we’ll even know it?
Since the review of the year is already over the networks might not even show it.

Our years fly by quickly enough as time is something we can never quite master
I can’t for the life of me figure out why we would want to make them go any faster!

Speaking for all the people born late, let’s wait till the new year has dawned
Before you tell everyone in the viewing audience that this year is already gone.

So as my birthday approaches at the end of this year here’s something you can all do for me.
Allow me to enjoy the last 12 days of the year as I did the other three hundred and fifty-three.