Abbreviator

Each crushing haiku
Is an abbreviator,
Squeezing every thought.

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Winter’s Haiku

You just don’t get it!
Winter’s haiku keeps the rules
Along with summer’s.

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Stubble

The yellow stubble standing in the field
Looks like abstract rows of unmarked graves.
It’s August dry, and summer’s burning waves
Have claimed another season’s joyful yield.

November’s rain will resurrect the dead
Descendants of this ageless sacrifice
And birth an endless stubble seed that spreads
Its golden glory to fashion paradise.

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The Revenant

This celluloid poetry –
Survival gore and gaunt revenge
Through bitter dark and snowy wild –
Winter’s light on naked fir –
Sleeping lakes and bloody words –
Metallic sounds of avalanche –
Droning chants on violin –
Drums rolling down the mountain –
The final chase and bladed end.

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Sacred Flight

There is a joy of beauty in the earth –
Cottoned sky and sweetened grass, both sight
And stunning scent seize my breath and birth
Within my dullish soul a sacred flight
To heaven’s court where praise is scored.
Both joy and praise to Him who is adored.

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Sackcloth

Starch and hang the sackcloth – a closet full –
A shroud for each and every one will be
Enough – the Persians are promised – see
Their long and steady oars that strain and pull
Towards your one time prized and peaceful shore.
Hear the voice of heaven, “Nevermore!”

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Satisfied

I’m content with what I see –
This land of mine I oversee
With little change seen north or south –
I’m content with a smiling mouth
That relishes the unchanged past –
Satisfied to hold it fast,
Curmudgeoning along the way –
Wishing it were yesterday.

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Chapter One

I started writing another book – the first
Is still a shredded pile of chapter one,
Waiting for me to glue it back together
One of these days when I’m done
With squeezing all the Arikaran maiden’s
Passion from her thunder-rolling past
And pen each spoken word that’s drenched and laden
With smiles and regal tears from first to last.

For every word there is a season,
Just never write without good reason.