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Archive for August, 2012

nostalgia be damned haiku

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on August 21, 2012| 3 Comments »

the thousandth peach
tasting it
as if it were the first

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Universal Haiku

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on August 20, 2012| 2 Comments »

so small this woman
reading of black holes, blue stars
feeling love that big

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Department of Defense

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on August 19, 2012| 4 Comments »

I had a dream I could fly. –Priscilla Ahn

The Blue Angels leave five white tracks overhead.
They are going eight hundred miles per hour,
the announcer says. Below them, I am going

nowhere. They fly closer to each other than my knees
are to the pier. Eighteen inches apart. What to make
of these details. The announcer spills them

through the radio like my brother’s dog
spills the half empty beer beneath the lawn chair.
It seems important, noteworthy, but later,

these points will not touch me the way your hands would.
It is more something to nod at, to say back and forth
to each other, to marvel at aloud. As if it could

bring us closer together, this trading of numbers
and shaking of heads. But the day is warm
and the body can’t help but tremble when the jets push

through the blue above us, displacing sound
and rearranging the air. It is not the speed
that impresses me or even the nearness

of wingtip to nose, but the way that over two million
of us have gathered to watch them fly
in close triangles and peel apart again.

How we long for greatness, how we’re drawn
to the fastest, the loudest, the best. How we long
to come together, to connect. I am not

the best, love. I am tired, getting old. I am
wrinkled and sun-speckled, forgetful and soft.
I am no longer fast, was never the fastest.

I am not strong. I’m defeated. I’m less.
But I am open to love, to being still.
I am ready to drop the stream of facts

and touch (is it possible) what is left.

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All There Is to Say

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on August 18, 2012| 2 Comments »

Not that the day is special,
though they all are, of course,
in their ordinary ways—how we
wake, say Good morning and kiss—
but today the challenge to move beyond habit,
beyond rote into simple communion
by breaking not bread but ourselves,
our routines, looking up from the paper,
the counter, to say what we mean:
How’d you sleep? Pass the tea.
I am scared. There’s a chill.
More juice? I’m so tired.
Please, don’t leave.

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how things change tanka

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on August 18, 2012| 3 Comments »

not right away
but at some point
it happened,
this barren, sterile field
began, so many shades, to bloom

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Millennium Park, Chicago

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , on August 17, 2012| 3 Comments »

In the heart of the city
the boy runs,
he leaps and arrives
in every puddle
until he is drenched,
dazzlingly wet.
His laugh is the laugh
we forget is always here
waiting to be laughed
come sun, come rain.

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In the Rose Garden Beneath the Museum

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on August 15, 2012| 3 Comments »


We ran from flower
to flower, thrusting
our noses into the rose bushes,
snagging our legs on the thorns
and calling to each other
to come, share this one,
yes, this one, so sweet.
It was a glorious searching,
though what was the point,
the perfume was everywhere.

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You Were Taught to Take Chances

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on August 15, 2012| 4 Comments »

When you stand on the ledge
six stories above the street,

you are perhaps lost, but
there is not a lot a map can tell you.

There is back in the window,
and there is down.

What is it that keeps you
from jumping.

You wouldn’t even need to jump.
Just trip. Lean. Step. Or if you sneeze,

it could be considered an accident.
Somehow easier that way to imagine it,

but how to explain the fact that you
climbed through the pane

out onto the railingless edge.
Someone would have to clean up

the splatter. That thought
is enough to hold you here,

back against the brick.
It’s not that you want to die.

Below, the cars crisscross and merge.
But how to go on living.

Beneath you the ravens weave.

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angel trumpet haiku

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on August 14, 2012| 1 Comment »

amdist the weeds
waist-high datura
one scrap of bliss

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Will You Stand at the Door for Me?

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on August 13, 2012| 3 Comments »

I try to tell him
it’s a story.
That Bloody Mary
is only imaginary.
That she cannot hurt him.
Still he insists that I
go with him to the bathroom.
“Cuz Mom, that’s where she kills you,”
he says. “That’s what they told me at camp.”
I hold his hand on the way there,
then stand guard at the door.
It is sweet, in its way,
his fear. So innocent.
So pure. I try to be
this compassionate
with myself, later,
thinking you no longer love me,
telling myself, that’s just
my imagination. Though
the prick of it, the
way I deflate, it feels
so real.

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