Frame of Reference [Free Verse]

Photograph taken at a butterfly sanctuary on Bohol Island, Philippines.
a butterfly hangs
upside down,

but it seems upside down
is as meaningless an
an abstraction for it
as the two million km/h
that a human sweeps,
spins, expands, etc.
through space
is for the person who
feels only the couch
against his backside.

what must it be to not know
upside down -- to feel free
to fall, knowing the air
will catch one?

Fungi Time [Haiku]

mushroom stands tall;
wasn’t there the day before,
may be gone the next.

Understory [Haiku]

big-leafed saplings
line the understory:
wee cascade murmurs.

Foggy Fort [Senryū]

Photograph taken atop Hrad Devín, near Bratislava on a foggy December day.
high on a hill fort --
enshrouded in clouds;
one can see for... meters?

Builder Limerick

Photograph of the inverted pyramid Radio Building in Bratislava, Slovakia.
A skilled Slovakian builder
got his plans and was bewildered.
They were upside down.
Had they been turned around
an Aide wouldn't 've fell from the basement, which killed her.

Animal Taxi Limerick

Photograph of an elephant on a truck taken in Sri Lanka at the Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage.
There once was an animal tow truck
that would taxi your horse or your duck.
Size wasn't deemed relevant
'til up showed an elephant,
and the overladen truck got stuck.

The Fig Treatment [Free Verse]

Photograph of a Buddha head carving enveloped by Strangler Fig at Wat Mahathat in Ayutthaya, Thailand.
On a scale from
"this is cozy"
to
"my skull is cracking,"
I wonder how the fig tree
at Wat Mahathat treats
the Buddha's head?

Buckingham Palace Limerick

Photograph of the changing of the guard
A randy guard of Buckingham Palace
stood at attention, but so, too, his phallus.
He did his very best -
stock still like all the rest,
but was exposed by tent and hand callus.

Tainted (Free Verse)

Photograph taken at Andersonville National Historic Site in central Georgia.
A gorgeous day:
the sky is blue;
the air is crisp,
and a bird swoops in low
over the field to land
in search of insects.

The sign is kind of a bummer:

It tells me that 13,000
people died here --
most by shitting themselves
into unconsciousness.
(it doesn't use those exact words.)

This is Andersonville --
site of a Civil War prison camp.

Here, I believe in ghosts.
I don't believe in ghosts
when drinking my morning coffee
at my dining room table.
I don't believe in them when I
turn off my bedside lamp.
I don't believe in them anywhere --
anywhere else -- really.

But here they vibrate up
through my boot heals,
and I fear I may
shit myself.

Beekeeper [Limerick]

Photograph of bees taken in the Mekong Delta region south of Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City.)
There was an equanimous beekeeper --
so calm he looked like an upright sleeper.
Slow & quiet on task
'til one got in his mask,
and blinded him with stings to each peeper.