PROMPT: Holiday Invention

Invent a holiday! Explain how and why everyone should celebrate.

Mad Saints Day. In honor of all the crazy sages throughout history (e.g. Hanshan, Diogenes the Cynic, Ikkyu, St. Isadora, Drukpa Kunley, Nasreddin, Milarepa, William Blake, etc.)

It’s celebrated by violating some societal convention that doesn’t have direct adverse health and safety consequences (This is not “The Purge.”) Of course, violating even the most absurdly arbitrary societal convention will cause many people to freak out, so the other element of celebrating Mad Saints Day is just getting the f@$& over it.

Crow Cabal [Haiku]

three crows circled up.
their conversational look
makes me nervous.

furu ike ya [Old Pond] by Matsuo Bashō

old pond,
 a frog jumps:
  "plop-splash!"

Original: 古池や蛙飛びこむ水の音; Romanized: furu ike ya kawazu tobikomu mizu no oto

Vanishing [Haiku]

crossing a clearing,
a deer disappears before
eyes can lock on it.

DAILY PHOTO: Harold Washington Library Center

PROMPT: Favorite Websites

What are your favorite websites?

I guess if time spent on them indicates “favoriteness,” that would be Google, YouTube, and WordPress— in who knows what order.

Octopus [Free Verse]

Eight arms
seeking eight
different states
of being.

Winding sinuously
toward eight
different ends.

Wrapping opposing
limbs around
antipodal objectives,
it risks tearing
itself in twain…

but knows better.

First to Fall [Haiku]

by the green river,
one tree prematurely
takes Fall colors.

DAILY PHOTO: Budapest’s Tiny Sculptures

Fog by Carl Sandburg

The fog comes
 on little cat feet.

It sits looking
 over harbor and city
  on silent haunches
 and then moves on.