The Year Poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
The Year
What can be said in New Year rhymes,
That's not been said a thousand times?
The new years come, the old years go,
We know we dream, we dream we know.
We rise up laughing with the light,
We lie down weeping with the night.
We hug the world until it stings,
We curse it then and sigh for wings.
We live, we love, we woo, we wed,
We wreathe our prides, we sheet our dead.
We laugh, we weep, we hope, we fear,
And that's the burden of a year.
This woman was born before her time. She was a proto-modernist. To feel the world's sting in an embrace...to rise on a sigh when one has no other wings, these are fine leaps of imagination. Sometimes the world opens in a sigh, and we feel others' suffering as well as our own.
Excellent contains all truths and feelings...i vote 10++++++++++++++
The truth of a year so candidly told touches my emotions and soul at the outset of the new year.........very outstanding..........thanks for sharing
A beautiful, sad, evocative and perceptive poem about the experience, the dread and the hope of the passing of time.
Yes, really that is that we are the burden of year when our expectation grows up gradually!
Ella was a poetess and wonderful woman born way beyond her time. What more is there to say except... thank you.
We laugh, we weep, we hope, we fear, And that's the burden of a year. Wonderful new years poem to start the year, a great choice, lets hope this years a hopeful burden.
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10/15/2026 2:16:20 PM # rel_20260925T122446Z_7d6ee41
An excellent poem to read on Jan 1st every year to prepare ourselves for what a year can bring us- both joy and sorrow.