Ringing In Another Year

So we bang our pots and pans and ring our bells and shake the noise makers. Say goodbye to 1963. We heard a dream and the reports of an assassin's rifle and the year ended in sorrow and in fear.
We heard a lot in 1963.
What's to come in 1964?
What will we hear?
The sounds of marching in the street, of black and white voices crying out for an end to hate and war and poverty?
Hands clenched in fists of rage and in a V asking for peace.
Fingers holding draft cards burning, and bras too.
The young and the old, their voices rising as they take to the streets looking for justice.
Will shots ring out, will bombs explode, killing people because of the color of their skin or the ideas in their heads?
Shall we dance to the sounds of a new beat coming from a distant shore, and will Elvis be King once more?
The music of Motown and Philly and the scene from California, bands in suits and pointy shoes and girls with big hair.
And what to hold on to - the same old red, white and blue? The myths and the legends, the outright lies and half-truths taught to us in school?
Do we hold on to childhood or can we still be safe in the arms of Captain Kangaroo and Sally Starr?
What will we see on the evening news, and will we see the truth after all or will we cling to that which is wrong but is safe, or will we turn over the rocks and watch the bugs squirm.
What will the children hear and say in this year of 1964?
Will we hear the right things, or will it all be muffled by the sound of helicopters and napalm falling on the jungles and villages of Vietnam?
Happy New Year?
I wonder.