Glorious sunshine today, quickly melting snow, ferocious warm wind. Here is a haiku I wrote while walking my dog.
Tumbleweed circles
Papers escape with proud wind
Joyous springtime flight.
C
3/7–
I just realized the opening of this post is ALMOST a haiku–but not quite as good as the one above. Here it is with a slight addition:
Glorious sunshine today
quickly melting snow shimmers
ferocious warm wind.
I am a stranger to its nuances
its secrets hidden beneath and at each bend,
but its power calls
its history beckons
as flattened waves caress the muddy shores.
Sailboats astride
power boats along
seventy-eight car freight train adjacent
neighboring bridges opposite
one rusted red-brown while
on its glamorous sister
cars traverse the shining pewter span.
Calming,
resolute
alive
current of two sorts: past and water
gulls screeching
crawfish digging
turtles burying
monarch hovering
eagle soaring.
The Mississippi River.
Written on the banks of the Mississippi in Dubuque, IA 9/09 C
Annie, you came into our lives
On your one-year birthday
So fearful, so quiet, so timid
Learning the way of family life
And friendship
And joy
From Maxx,
Watching carefully,
Then accepting, loving, no longer hiding.
Your favorite days
Were always a run on the beach,
Chasing the birds, the dogs, the spirits
Us almost losing you on a fog-filled beach in Washington
Our only clue your jingling collar
As we yelled for you in vain, and hope.
You have hiked from San Francisco
To Portland
To Sedona
To Chicago
To our neighborhood,
Seeming to smile all the way
The kindest soul I have ever met
Who taught many people to love dogs
Just sitting patiently
Rolling over for a rub,
Stealing a kiss
Never asking,
Always giving.
We shall miss your gentle aura
The softness of your fur
You herding us playing baseball or football
Your kind brown eyes
Your patience.
Be free
Of your aged body
But your always-young soul,
Find your friend Maxx
Who taught you to love
And be there to lead me
Someday.
Written for my wonderful Annie, who we lost just shy of her 17th birthday.
5/3/1992-3/26/09
Here is an untitled poem I wrote partially in my head this morning while on a run in my neighborhood.
Crinkly and curled
some hollow, others flattened
coiled into half-letter shapes
C I S L N
pointing the way from the soaked grass
over the raised curb
and onto the street-
now unable to move further
having escaped their rain-filled holes
they wither, dry out, and die
unable to slide home again
after the storms end.
So sorrowful,
oodles of stretched out worms
I aim to avoid
along my pathway.
It’s funny, that writing in my head I can never remember the exact words when I transfer them onto paper. But I can certainly still picture the worms I saw today! C
