A Riffle in the Stream

sinking

onto creaky knees

she dams the brook

with shining pebbles . . .

time wells up and overflows

a west wind

circles the empty house

scattering

petals on the grass

she lets go her names

she comes

to the end of her path 

through the wood…

no trace of her footsteps

on moss deeper than memory

~cattails 3: Sept. 2014

doves

only bones
under the turned earth
of Bloody Kansas—
those passenger pigeons
the Choctaw called lost doves

~Atlas Poetica 18, July 15, 2014

mourning doves
drawn to a decoy—
our fascination
with the whirligig wings

of war

~Haiku News 2:31, 10/25/13

stone

long ago
I scaled a boulder 
the glacier left behind – 
my knee still bleeds 
against the granite edge of time 


~Ribbons 10:2, spring/summer 2014 

a stone woman

gives birth to a child

in the night

my book falls open

to the words, I need . . .

~NeverEnding Story: One Man’s Maple Moon, 8/7/14

(The quotation in the second tanka is from Mountains and Rivers Sutra by Japanese Soto Zen Master Dogen Kigen, 1200–1253)

thyme

substituting
summer savory
for thyme
I concoct a recipe
for the autumn of my life


~Moonbathing 9, Fall/Winter 2013-14