-

NYE
As a child, I only wantedto stay up until midnight,actually a bit after that time,to see in the new year. I didn’t need to beat my parents’ party, itwas too loud and the adultsbehaved more like my kidbrother and sister asthe magic moment approached. And it was supposed to bea magical moment, althoughno one could…
-

MARS
Mars has risen in the western sky. Perhaps it is waiting for the moonto draw our attention,but the moon is periodicallyirascible, as tonight, and haschosen to abandon Marsto the stellar firmament. Mars has risen in the western sky. I wander into the dark in searchof the peace that onlynight affords, but the horizonis war and…
-

WETLAND HAIKU
Beside the still ponddragonflies hover lightlysenbazuru dawn The Great Egret staresthe still pond returns his staredawning sun laughing Clouds swallow the moonmoorhens chanting their vesperssleep overtakes us A dragonfly sitswaiting for us to take winggravity says no
-

OF DREAMS
Last night in my sleepI though I heard an angelalthougn I could not, for trying,understand what it was saying,and it is odd since Ido not believe in angels. Perhaps it was the cat,but if so she has come upwith a new voice, using wordsnot formerly in her vocabulary,but you put nothingpast a cat, ever. I…
-

CANINE
The dog refuses to walkaround the house and checkthe driveway, and sothe shells will rain on the villageas they do each time she senses fear. She has a sight beyond thatI can fathom, curled underthe heat vent, as thoughthe cries of children carryin her dreams, her taildances against the grate. On most nights when she…
-

CONVERSATION
Arising into nightthe departing suntangoes away with its cloud,memories soon forgotten.Other dancers take the stage,now a romance, nowa war dance, feathers raisedin prayer to unseen gods.Night will soon bringits curtain across this stage,the avian cast’s final bows takenthe theatre will darken, awaitinganother performance,a new script tomorrow,but for this solitary momentof frozen grace, it is wewho…
-

RETURNING
The Great Egrets swoop low,make a slow banking turnand alight in the leafless tree. They sit imagining water,the wetland they knewa month or so ago, nowmore a mud flat all waitingfor the rainy season’s arrival. They leave as night approaches,the once wetland suddenlyagain silent, and we areleft to dream of the flocksof ibis, herons and…
-

ABSOLUTION
The birds in the wetlandspeak to me in my dreams,telling tales of what this placewas before we arrivedand forever changed it. They don’t curse us, althoughthey remind us we are cursedby our own actions, butthey do pity us, ground boundliving in our own waste. In the morning the birdshave disappeared, a fewvultures carrying off the…
-

FOR SALE
For a reasonable sum,I can have a star named after me,and get a certificate suitablefor framing declaring it so. I’d like to buy a group of starsin relatively close proximityeach to the others, and ratherthan naming each after me, I’d name the lot with one name,my personal constellation,perhaps Buddhist, the sky coulduse a Bodhisattva of…
