prickles of mist

summer solstice—
prickles of mist
dissolving
the old ghosts 
inside my skin

      ~The Bamboo Hut 1:1, August 2013

passing strangers
on a rain-drenched road
we turn back 
to ask their stories
. . . finding only mist

    ~Tinywords 14.1, May 2, 2014

Deep River

I listen
for the sound of water 
in a dry stream bed . . .
the pulse of yes 
beginning in my veins

a spring
rises out of the earth—
I drink
from its oak-dark eye
a glimmer of starlight 

water
like silk against my skin
I swim naked
in a sea of words
waiting to be born


    ~Lynx 29: 1, Feb. 2014 

moonlight & magic

jimson weed—
violet moonflowers
open at dusk
the shaman’s magic
unbidden at my door

   ~Atlas Poetica 14, March 2013

moving by moonlight 
to the words 
dancers must practice 
where they are— 
my heart’s slow tango 

    ~Skylark 2:1, summer 2014

Liturgy of the Hours

My old banjo clock used to run for eight days straight, but now it stops after only a few hours. I carry it to Rick’s Timeshop, where several hundred ticking, tocking voices mark eternity. While Rick peers into the innards behind my clock’s face, one of the cuckoo clocks on the wall chirps out the hour, accompanied, surprisingly, by the sound of water running over stones.  Thoreau’s dictum—time is but the stream I go a-fishing in—rises to the surface of my mind. 

cuckoos
counting out the hours
of my life
by a babbling brook—
I steal a dipperful of silver

                          ~Haibun Today 8:2, June 2014

two birds

these bobolinks
migrating home—
sojourners
in a Sabbath meadow 
with Emily and me

  ~Skylark 1:2, winter 2013

calling
the hermit thrush calling
myself. . . 
the answer comes
in a tongue I cannot speak


  ~The Bamboo Hut 1:1, August 2013

dreamlets

I wake
to the first scent 
of lilac . . .
sixty years ago, 
six hundred miles away


    ~Atlas Poetica 15, July 2013


orb webs
suspended
between power lines . . .
dreamlets evaporate 
in the morning sun


    ~The Bamboo Hut 1: 2, Jan. 2014

Long Shadows

Among the haunting images of animals—bison, bear, and spotted horse—painted on the walls of caves, human handprints catch the eye. Careful measurement reveals that most are the hands of women.  Could they be maker’s marks?  

firelight
dancing on the walls
the sister
I never had
touches my hand 

               ~Skylark 2: 1 summer 2014