.
something
about
a barn
in a sense
we’re all
incarnate
.
with
a second left
on the timer
January
misspells
itself.
.
feathers
but not
enough
to reassure me
of your
innocence
.
.
Month: January 2013
(purple haze)
.
purple haze
he answers my fire
with smoke
.
.
(work)
.
what do you mean, you can’t read my handwriting? oh, fine then.
.
black ice
the splinter tries
to work its way out
.
(causes)
.
.
northward journey
of wings–
the original
causes
of love
.
the p-word
.
1
poetry
if it weren’t
for the words
.
2
the poetry
expedition
discovers
a spare sky
for unused stars
.
3
an iceberg
engraved
with your parting speech
I’ve had it
with poetry
.
4
poetry–
my casual attitude
toward shipwrecks
.
5
a single
error
in the code
the end of
poetry
.
6
poetry
mapping my mind
with buckshot
.
7
a clinical tool
to determine
the extent
of my enlightenment
poetry
.
8
poetry
the sounds
from the empty
torture
chamber
.
9
poetry
after going
to all that trouble
I forget to destroy
the world
.
.
123/7
.
forty
days and nights
of rain
the stereoscope
leaks
dimensions
.
tidepool
a dissected
starfish
the color
of my inner
eye
.
appointed
to a cabinet
position
I bet everything
on a passing
cloud
.
.
(check)
.
I check my email again
four light years
from the nearest star
,
Deneb my lost century
.
starlight
the unidentified
weapon
.
(finer)
.
early spring sun I grate him finer and finer
.
Frogpond 35.3
.
.
January if I ever rise from the dead
.
1
Dribbling from my mouth into the standpipe this sentence all I eviscerate.
.
2
The god that disappeared between massacres one of the four names he was known by in the south.
.
3
On the bulletproof vest ancient ideograms for target practice.
.
4
Rolling away the exsanguinated bodies a child carries a doll with an extra limb.
.
5
Next to the Victrola a wasps’ nest for sale sitting inside it I plan my own assassination.
.
6
Cutting spare keys for a blown-glass dungeon.
.
7
In the eye of a hurricane kick-the-can and a slip knot.
.
8
Drip-drying a body cast in the middle of a plaster war.
.
9
Black velvet never thought she was good enough to be amputated.
.
10
If no one deboned it shoving torture to the other end of the sofa.
.
a day in the life
.
morning rain
the tapping
of my spoon
against the cereal bowl
.
all the people
in the other cars
not me
.
slate sky restoring a previous version
.
noon haze
between office buildings
I repeat my password
.
…leaving
the parking
………garage
……………the fog
…..through
..the automatic
…….gate
.
bark, howl, whisper
.
.
favourite*
.
Haiku New Zealand asked me a while back to write up a list of my favorite haiku for their web site, which I agreed to do even though I thought it would be very hard. I was wrong. I won’t say any more about that because I say it over at Haiku New Zealand, so check it out.
So now I’m curious about what other people’s favorite haiku are. Do you have any? Do you think it would be hard to decide on some? What do you think of my choices? What are you having for lunch? Comment below.
.
___________________________________________________________
*One of my favorite things about this entire project was having my bland American spelling of “favorite” corrected to make it more New Zealand-y.
.
desktop
123/6
.
.
worshipping
graven
images
in a hall
of
mirrors
.
crepuscular
your
invisibility
continues to
betray
you
.
midwinter
snow
blindness
prevents me
from reading
my tombstone
.
.
(intra)
.
.
intravenously she must have asked for it
.
born
broken
the shell
of her
only
egg
.
wherever he’s inserted entropy
.
.
(static)
.
.
static; interference; trying; to; tell; you
.
.
This haiku was born out of sheer cussedness. I got irritated with everyone saying it wasn’t a good idea to put semicolons in haiku. I got irritated with everyone being down on semicolons in general. What does everyone know, anyway? I decided to write a bunch of haiku with semicolons in them and make everyone admit how great they were.
It turns out that the reason everyone says it’s a bad idea to put semicolons in haiku is that it really doesn’t usually work well at all to put semicolons in haiku. So my defiant experiment was largely a failure. Except for this one. I kind of like this one. And it has five semicolons in it. In case you hadn’t counted.
.
(they say)
123/5
.
solstice
light
therapy
challenges
me
to a duel
.
offering
oranges
to a god
who doesn’t
believe
in citrus
.
January
nothing
but ice
and a newly
sharpened
knife
.
123/4
.
still
inside
me
unified
field
theory
.
housebound
every
door
just
another
opening
.
rosebush
attenuated
women
discuss
their favorite
thorns
.
sounded
.
pack of condoms carbon nanotubes bobblehead
.
spackled drift of feathers hefty toppling of rafters
.
flat white Cheshire cat half measures
.
