New Year Games (Poem)

New Year Games

With every shuffle of the deck
we play a different hand,

your life, then mine, resolving
on one last roll of the dice.

You go first; pull spades, black
suits reminding me how, inverted,

hearts on short stems have to
pump extra hard. I kiss each cube

before casting the two together,
reluctant to admit I have no ace

in the hole. What a single pip
foretells is my step; it's taken.

A consequence always follows.
I draw Joker. No card's unused.

© Maureen E. Doallas