2020: Continue

I've been struggling to find words and the emotions to enter into 2020—a year that if I'm truthful, has me feeling a bit like I'm in a ship without a rudder approaching a storm. I posted a dreadful post late last night full of self pity and negativity. But that is not how I wish to approach this coming decade, this next year, this day, or this moment, so I deleted it.
Then while reflecting on what has passed and what I wish to create in the future, I read these words by Maya Angelou. So with them I wish to welcome 2020, and may I put my best into achieving this vision.

Continue

—Maya Angelou, originally written as a birthday gift to Oprah Winfrey

On the day of your birth
The Creator filled countless storehouses and
stockings
With rich ointments
Luscious tapestries
And antique coins of incredible value
Jewels worthy of a queen’s dowry
They were set aside for your use
Alone
Armed with faith and hope
And without knowing of the wealth which awaited
You broke through dense walls
of poverty
And loosed the chains of ignorance which
threatened to cripple you so that you
could walk
A Free Woman
Into a world which needed you
My wish for you
Is that you continue
Continue 
To be who and how you are
To astonish a mean world
With your acts of kindness
Continue
To allow humor to lighten the burden
of your tender heart
Continue
In a society dark with cruelty
To let the people hear the grandeur
Of God in the peals of your laughter
Continue
To let your eloquence
Elevate the people to heights
They had only imagined
Continue
To remind the people that
Each is as good as the other
And that no one is beneath
Nor above you
Continue
To remember your own young years
And look with favor upon the lost
And the least and the lonely
Continue
To put the mantel of your protection
Around the bodies of
The young and defenseless
Continue
To take the hand of the despised
And diseased and walk proudly with them
In the high street
Some might see you and
Be encouraged to do likewise
Continue
To plant a public kiss of concern
On the cheek of the sick
And the aged and infirm
And count that as a
Natural action to be expected
Continue
To let gratitude be the pillow
Upon which you kneel to
Say your nightly prayer
And let faith be the bridge
You build to overcome evil
And welcome good
Continue
To ignore no vision
Which comes to enlarge your range
And increase your spirit
Continue
To dare to love deeply
And risk everything
For the good thing
Continue
To float
Happily in the sea of infinite substance
Which set aside riches for you
Before you had a name
Continue
And by doing so
You and your work
Will be able to continue
Eternally