He held his bible,
bookmarked by bank account stubs,
against acid rains.
Tag: haiku
Five Haikus
Thus, dreams were dance floors
full of the dainty footsteps
of raindrop fairies.
Nyx perched in treetops,
lividly leering through a
cataract-eyed moon.
Having a sinkhole
soul, he preached in the church while
the foundation sank.
The Queen’s Word
Like a sharp penknife,
her tone split hearts and quill shafts
to bleed ink and blood.
To Atticus, Sincerely
Instagram models
somehow survive diets of
makeup and canned cheese.
Existential Crises
The fat-cheeked chipmunk
paused while collecting acorns,
wondering what for.
A lone, dark-eyed doe
trembled in winter’s wasteland;
fawns inert in snow.
The fox limped along,
a broken forepaw dangling
as frost glossed her pelt.
Articulation: Three Variations
Haiku:
My thoughts are scattered
like toys from a toybox, spilled
by an angry boy.
Rhyme:
Stumbling, at times, over my own thoughts
like a boy whose toybox has been upended,
scattering about army men, dinosaurs, robots,
all scarcely coherent in a clutter, untended.
Vers Libre:
My words became as
action figures with articulated limbs
interlocked together
in a cramped toybox, difficult to
extract
without pulling up a riot of
entwined bodies, fighting to
select the one desired
and losing my peace to a tantrum,
kicking the toybox over, spilling
its convoluted hoard
and stumbling over the mess,
the thoughts
strewn out
like a battlefield of fallen brothers
unwilling to let go of one another,
even in death,
for the fleeting chance
at animated life.
Haikus
Perhaps Jesus just
faked his death to skip paying
for the Last Supper.
He thought his mind was
a steel trap, but really it
was just dummy-locked.
Her widow’s veil was
black cobweb behind which she
licked her scarlet lips.
“Eyes lie,” he would say.
“Watch the hips as they pivot.”
True in fights, and sex.
Like a Rubik’s cube
rhyming poetry must be
puzzled out by turns.
Haiku Halftime Show
Legalese is smoke
from a dragon just before
it burns you in court.
Pretty petal mouth
fragrant and pink and blooming,
hiding a wasp’s sting.
The busy spider
scrambled up its dew-jeweled web,
fussing over guests.
She dreamt of flying,
her young wings clipped and crippled
by her mother’s tongue.
Ghost-faced bandits steal
through the misty midnight dark;
opossums on the move.
To purify wells
by drinking up the poison:
subprime mortgage loans.
They crucified Christ
everyday, their hatred
biting hard like nails.
Little fawn baffled
by fluttering butterflies;
the joys of childhood.
Sleepy-headed boy
nods on the couch, King Arthur
knighting him in dreams.
Whiskey yeast prospers,
distilling what will kill it—
as do humans, too.
The doll did not move
as she hid in the toy box,
fearing sweaty hands.
He wrote poetry
as passementeries stitched
to life’s humdrum hems.
To wed to that name
was to noose oneself with a
gold-inscribed choker.
Her blouse button popped
with the heaving sighs of her
harlequin daydreams.
Her breasts spoke true
with their deep cleavage divide;
a divided heart.
How like a hammer
his thought, a chisel his word—
Freemason wizard.
Witching Hour Haikus
Her words were written
upon hearts as on tombstones;
cold, hard, deep, final.
“Teach a man to fish”
they say, as if they don’t own
every river.
Streets cobbled with skulls
and anthems of unheard screams—
parade of empire.
He clung to belief
as if a shipwreck’s flotsam,
but t’was the iceberg.
They all vowed she was
the salt of the earth, and so
she salted the earth.
Firstborn of Egypt,
did not you die innocent
as God’s other Son?
