Category: Issue 15.2

summertime– let the screen door bang  

summer sunlight through a green lace canopy the energy that slips through my imperfect plans  

seasons repeat we tell the stories we are given       (Originally published in Mayfly 58, Winter 2015)

swapping work stories his pint of beer has more foam  

  late summer mating dragonflies extend each other

  my feelings for her fireflies

  that raccoon you know is out there — a summer fling

A haibun by Charles Tarlton

    spring light tadpoles growing into their tails    

  I tell my son it’s okay to be fragile… basil blossoms  

    filling up the kiddie pool a mom’s guilt

  pebbles in the tide my regrets lose their rough edges  

The sound of a door behind me closing on one less summer day

  an ice cream truck jingles its tune down a dead end street  

last rites. . . rain fading into bird song     (Received 1st Place in the 2015 Betty Drevniok Award)

autumn wind for the cat now, my feet no longer a toy

autumn stars she hopes to go in her sleep

  an elm in all its basketry— the moon  

  my first earrings box elder tree seedpods

  beyond the protest willow limbs shifting with the breeze  

  a bullfrog hits the lower registers weeping willow song  

  dandelion clock my grandchildren think I’m a grown-up

  windflower the sun and moon on a single stem  

  Forgetting how big the world is . . . framed butterflies

  Dad’s old maps a pinhole through the b of Timbuktu

twilight losing count of blackberries

  after 15 years i find his address in his own writing… stargazing again on a moonless night

a man by his mailbox reads a letter, then reads it again— spring melancholy

  cataract clouds . . . her children remind her what she likes

  she waves a thin blue scarf becoming sky  

  cloud shadows on the highway scudding a h e a d  

  I cycle through cloud formations laundry day

laundromat a penny’s rhythmic clink in the dryer drum

  ending in wind chimes— the heat

  breaking drought— from cupped hands the child tastes the sky  

  woodpecker holes… the constellation’s name slips my mind

tree stump the unfiltered full moon’s light

  cold moon the sound of my words in her eyes

  Alice in Her Twilight Years We were cleaning out Mom’s house when we found them in the back of a cupboard, two zaftig Barbies covered in cookie crumbs.

  abandoned house in the window a doll without eyes  

  clouds opening the blue of her eyes

  clouds gone the clarity of shadows  

  living a shallow life sunfish

alpenglow the minnow slips a second paw

  canyon stream dried to a slit of clear sky       (included in A Dictionary of Haiku, AHA Books, 2013)

  the brittle call of a skylark – still no rain

  how little I know of bird calls distant thunder     (Akita International Haiku Award, First Prize, September 2013)  

  low tones from the dirt dauber’s nest we speak of war  

bare trees the credits for the war movie white on black

  discarding thirty-year-old letters . . . the fresh scent of pine seedlings springing up in the clear cut  

  beaver den the piling up of things  

  of what was he a hoarder pinwheels in a breeze  

    autumn walk my brother leaves the path first

  The path home – polishing a neighbor’s apple on my sleeve

  how to win you back mockingbird from the neighbor’s yard       (from The Opposite of Bird, Cyberwit, 2015)

early autumn henna in her hair  

  reunion … upon my paper boats the raindrops       (originally appeared in Modern Haiku, 46.3)

  pastas, soups and Turkish bread at my door … her generous spirit colors my cheeks  

    pastry chef full of himself  

  mother’s eulogy finally I tell her what she wanted to hear  

  withered chrysanthemums — my father gives me a compliment

  family photograph all our smiles framed in a lie  

    dry leaves– helping my father with his death poem

    shared memory— the flutter of a million wings in the monarch sanctuary

    shrieking gull falling from a cliff this fear of flying  

Ten times ten thousand terrible things in this world and still I don’t want to leave it       (from Dreams Wander On, Contemporary Poems of Death

dust devils the rumble of fracking trucks on a washboard road  

summer drought a farmhand’s sweat wets the sod       (Previously published on Cattails, May 2015)

  last day of therapy a man takes the out of order sign off the candy machine  

  talking done the dregs of friendship in our mugs  

  unfinished argument all the thistles down the lane flowering  

    shattered by a jay’s raw blue afternoon  

    red Martian sky the differences between us  

  runaway star a streak of silver in my hair

    winter solstice — the day lengthened by snow light  

  sleepless — my window floats through a thousand stars

  old train set I unbox my inner child  

    visitors coming where to hide our bad habits       (Included in A Dictionary of Haiku, AHA Books, 2013)

    river tides where have I been

  the deer pauses before turning back into mist  

  and afterwards you don’t say anything but your eyes flash like lightning off in the distance

  gave proof through the night iPhones

    we order Cognac I ignore how you ignore her texts

    bumper sticker covering the chip on her shoulder

  solitaire the missing queen keeps me awake

fireweed twice in love twice burned

    another social construct on shaky ground

    Outdoor wedding the odor of insect repellent

    after the ceremony gossiping jackdaws

  cathedral stairs five brides vying for the best light    

    diamond ring all the facets of desire

u n z i p p i n g her dress f a l l s

  Valentine’s Day the palm reader’s warm hands

    final departure after the contrail starlight