Noir Jungle Variations

Haiku
The blinds half-open,
neon light, her nude body
striped like a tiger.

Rhyme
Blinds half-open, the neon light
clawed through to the wet, steamy bed,
her bare breasts were striped black and white
with hot light and cool shade. I said,
“Do you always play with your food?”
She giggled, wiped froth off her lips
and said, “When I am in the mood.”
Legs spread, she gyrated her hips.
Lounging like a tigress she growled
as she pulled me atop her pelt.
“Feed me,” she said, her moans so loud,
and the moist jungle could be felt.

Haiku Tribute: Onibaba

Mask among moonlight,
grimace with a lacquered gleam
and a pox beneath.

Bare-breasted mother
nurses demons with the milk
her dead son once drank.

The pitfall awaits
in the midst of envy’s chase;
a hole unsated.

Samurai are stripped
like carrion in the field
for handfuls of rice.

Japan is haunted
not by the ghosts of the dead,
but of the living.

Haiku Review: Elden Ring

Such long wanderings
through unknown territories,
the five stars aligned.

My deaths undeserved,
punishments random, unearned,
much like life itself.

Beast madness, dark souls,
crystal magic, lords of blood—
the past is present.

Death is the fell foe
which bear-coated allies face—
no Guts, no glory.

Read the runes of fate
like a blind woman’s fingers,
clutching in despair.

Twice victorious,
yet the gold crown sits aslant
above frenzied eyes.