There was an old woman from Kyrgyzstan
who went to the lake daily, feeding swans,
but it’s not a swan lake —
just plovers, gulls, and crakes
learned the woman who’d been badly conned.
Kyrgyzstan Limerick
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Tag Archives: poem
Five Tiny Haiku
I
the forest,
seen from a child’s height,
shares secrets
II
lifting leaves,
I find a pale, sad sprout
ready to rise
III
sunflower seed:
carried across the floor
by dogged ants
IV
floating leaf,
twisting as it glides
down river
V
a spider,
dangling by its web,
feels each breeze
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POEM: Faces & Places of My Dreams
I once read that one never dreams:
-a place one hasn’t been, or
-a face one hasn’t seen.
This is either false, or
I’ve been a lot of places:
-of which I’ve no waking recollection,
-which don’t exist in my photos, and
-which no one ever asks me,
“Do your remember that place…”
I’m less confident that my mind generates faces —
except that I’ve dreamt featureless faces, and
I’ve sure never seen one of those while awake.
But, given that a blonde wig on a brunette actress is
— apparently —
enough to keep me from identifying her,
I can’t be certain that I dream faces,
faces I’ve never seen in the real world —
and there have been oh so many faces.
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POEM: The Flood [a Triolet]
The pounding rain will ease,
but still the flood follows.
The gale becomes a breeze.
That pounding rain will ease!
And stillness tames the trees
while runoff swamps the hollows.
That pounding rain will ease,
but still that flood follows.
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A Sad Limerick of Laos
There was a cautious family from Laos
who decided not to live in a house.
“Old bombs make us quiver;
it’s safer on the river,”
said the boathouse-living family of Laos.
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POEM: Creeping Colonization
The tender end of a creeper —
whip thin, light-green, and curling —
cantilevers itself across a chasm,
reaching toward our balustrade.
It pretends to be blown by wind,
but it’s just using the gusts
to lazily set its hook.
It will colonize our balcony,
if it’s given half a chance;
it will weave out our windows —
blocking out the sun
by the time we return from holiday.
It may work slowly,
but it’s more clever than you know.
People are intrigued by those shows &
books about the world “after humans.”
We show amazement at the projections
of how quickly nature will reclaim “our space,”
but shouldn’t we be the last to be surprised?
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POEM: An Angelic Take on Time
“We, who move through this world, have varied gifts,” said the angelic figure who saw the world without time.
She could hold infinite temporal cross-sections in her mind at once. Though she usually focused on one time at a time as you and i might focus our vision on a bird sitting on a lamp post — knowing that one can shift one’s visual attention at will.
Her mind snaps from mundane moments to the nearest frenetic second — be it tragic or festive. Just as your eye would snap from the bird on the lamp post to a furry canine shape, trotting into one’s periphery; her mind snapped to the “good part” of the story.
While you may think yourself either alive or dead, to her you are a Schrödinger’s cat of both alive and dead, but her mind always wants to snap to the second of transformation.
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A Limerick of Kenya
There was a Professor from Kenya
who was hoping to soon make ten-ya.
He studied the past,
but, there, things move fast —
always outrunning that scholar from Kenya.
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POEM: The Cut Worm
Blake said, “The cut worm forgives the plow.”
This might make me wonder whether the plowman gains the same grace,
but I don’t think one can comprehend forgiveness
if one isn’t already prone to grudge-holding.
The cut worm doesn’t forgive, because no alternative exists.
Before we reach the point at which worms need to learn forgiveness
they will have gone on strike from their soil-churning duties —
crops will wither and fail
&
we’ll already be wondering whether we can ever forgive
the worms for their impudence.
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POEM: EXPLORE! [a Rubāʿī]
Go seek the ill-trodden pathway,
the well-sheltered cove, strait, or bay —
the inn where few have known to stay,
&
isles known only to castaways.
