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648 · Mar 2016
Loss
i used to catch bees
in the palm of my hand
they never stung me
now i am an adult
i am afraid to try
Tanka
645 · Nov 2015
Gobbledegook
you are speaking
but I can't grasp your meaning
slippery words
Senryu
645 · Dec 2014
Frustration
Trying and failing
A spider in the bathtub
Slips down the smooth wall
Haiku
644 · Oct 2015
Pluggin Along
i chaw a trifle
a quid of desparate thoughts
soon hawked on a page
Senryu
No, i do not chew tobacco
642 · Sep 2012
A prelude to grief
She lay still, eyes fixed
But then her eyes lit and she
Said:" I will die soon."
642 · Sep 2012
The Grand Life
My Darling, my Child!
My Little Baby Dumpling!
May Your Child grow true!
638 · Apr 2015
Alone
The clink and clatter
Of oyster shells neath my feet
Gulls shrieking above
Waves pounding and hissing back
With salt tinged breezes
I tramped along the shoreline
Till the sun dropped down
And quenched neath the horizon
Then phosphorescence
Shimmering, lively and cold
Edged the briny surf
I stopped and turned to the deep
Wishing you were there with me
Choka
637 · Feb 2016
Love Making
making love to you
pushing deep inside of you
and spilling my soul
Senryu
628 · Apr 2015
Bliss
Lying on my back
Amidst the manzanita
Gazing at the sky
Crickets and cicadas chant
Shrill and sonorous
As I leave myself and fly
A single raven
Soaring the wild blue yonder
All my torments left behind
Choka
628 · Jun 2016
Forget
pretty little bird
flitting around the garden
please don't fly away
there is no other sunshine
on this grey and lonely day
your swiftness and bright colours
they light up my broken heart
that's all that i really need
please stay a little longer
so i can watch, smile and
begin to forget
Choka
626 · Oct 2015
The Pilgrimage
each of us clamber
through the stages of our lives
scaling monoliths
Senryu
623 · Jan 2013
Morning Fog
Fog in gray blankets
Draws thick curtains across streets
Covers the Buildings
Hides shapes and steals colour
Sirens and red lights burst through
Tanka
622 · Oct 2015
Me Da
My father was strict
that is all I knew of him
for many a year
but time softened his armor
and I caught fleeting glimpses
of a wild, young, smart alex
a wise guy in the thirties
cruised the world on a steamship
from Montreal he sailed
through the atlantic ocean
St. Helena, round the horn
Polinesia, Asia
New Zealand, Australia
then around Cape of Good Hope
and back to Montreal town
Canada mid-depression
he drove from Ontario
to BC's wild coast
it's there he met my mother
and she hated him at first
but his bright, sparkling blue eyes
shock of red hair and sharp wit
soon won her heart completely
but when they were to marry
the world war got in the way
so it was off to England,
then to sunny Sicily
and up through old Italy
one week Yugoslavia
then up through France and Belgium
struggles in the Netherlands
and into the fatherland
thinking his luck had run out
then saved by a rosary
remaining an agnostic
and part of a force that
relieved one of the death camps
and seared by what he saw there
then returning home again
into the arms of his love
i arrived some years later
when his time came and he passed
and i was clearing his things
i noticed a framed picture
that he kept by his bedside
a sepia photograph
of a tiny, barefoot boy
wearing a ragged straw hat
astride a giant clydesdale
sporting a sassy, bright smile
i wish i knew him
choka
622 · Mar 2015
A Manner of Speaking
I am not concerned
About what you think of me
But mind your manners
Haiku
622 · Jun 2016
Devotion
in spring i inhale
and float away through summer
autumn i exhale
and sink back down through winter
a seasonal procession
a cyclic pranayama
my annual kundalini
it fills me with the desire
to live and to love
Choka
620 · Feb 2016
If (by Rudyard Kipling)
f you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
  But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
  Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
  And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
  If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
  And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
  Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
  And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
  And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
  And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
  To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
  Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
  Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
  If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
  With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
  And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son.
615 · Apr 2014
The Sounds of Silence
A shell, the ocean.
My ears, the empty silence.
She has gone away.
Haiku
615 · Sep 2012
Alight
Though this sun lowers
In the sky and falls toward
Winter, I am bright
614 · Jun 2016
Greed
the sickness of greed
where more never satisfies
a cold empty heart
Senryu
612 · Sep 2012
Prisoner of love
Imprisoned by love
With sweet cupid the jailer
Never felt so free
610 · Dec 2015
Winter
Winter whispers
outside my bedroom window
snowplows grumble
Haiku
606 · Apr 2015
Covenant
I welcome you in
With the respect you are due
And listen to you
Without judgement or critique
I hear your concerns
And strive to understand them
I share my concerns
With honesty and respect
Acting together
We will find the solutions
To face the future
With unobstructed conviction
And uncondional love
Choka
601 · Oct 2015
Closed
your eyes are open
but your broken heart is closed
for renovations
Senryu
600 · Mar 2015
Fail
Too big to fail, eh?
In your ivory towers
Bankers, marketeers
Doubtless you care not to see
Your scourge on humanity
Tanka
600 · Jun 2016
The Nightmare
within and among
the dark deep velvet heavens
in dream and without
floating drifting through the vast
all sewn with stars like raisins
part cloak and part crown of thorns
i spin there quite untethered
wending the giant smallness
of my bare humanity
a partial somnambulist
peering from one squinting eye
at realities cold light
afraid of mortal blindness
and trying to dream
Choka
When people deep in thought
Ask with theory sought
"What comes of us in death?"
"Do we take wings like our breath?"
It's then time to say; fate makes us her play
With no ordinary stage nor script on page
Act one a prophet in clouds
Act two a body in shrouds
The theme to love the soul as god
And love for body evilly odd
The plot to hate the ****** norm
And raise the soul to immortal form
So strange a scene to me
With many a vain soliloquy
Questioning life from it's birth
In scriptures lacking mirth
And placing mind over matter
For teatime with the mad hatter

Please, come and hold my hand
And walk across the shining sand
Feel it's softness on your feet
And sunshines loving heat
Leave your clouds until tomorrow
Then you won't have to borrow
Spiritual bread from the dead
Wrote this when I was 16
595 · Jun 2014
A Tear & a Smile
Two shining ribbons
Spanning dark and sullen skies
A double rainbow
Vivid colours, stormy day
Acrobat crows tumble past
tanka
594 · Feb 2016
Twilight
dark house, yellow light
voices, plates clattering
nighthawks fly silent
Haiku
593 · Mar 2016
Daydreams
somewhere within
ideoglyphs sail my minds
prevailing wind
Senryu
590 · Apr 2013
Don Juanabee
I heard you say, "Nice!"
As you took a swig of beer
Watching pretty girls
Dressed in bright dresses, stroll by
Funny that you looked so grim
tanka
590 · Sep 2012
Winter's Sting
Worker Bees buzz
Filling combs with sweet honey
To dull Winter's sting
589 · Jul 2016
Take The Chance
let love rule your life
and peace fill your heart and mind
reject fear and hate
and you will be wealthier
than you will ever need be
and you will be happier
than your wildest dreams
Choka
585 · Feb 2016
Wake
my eyes wide open
on my back on my bed
i remember you
Senryu
585 · Jul 2016
On The Clock
when you are alive
it seems like forever
but when you are dead
it's like no time at all
584 · Oct 2015
A Gentle Prod
you, laughing again
caressing my beard, touching
and all that that means
Senryu
584 · Dec 2014
The Great Explorer
Once, a nut brown boy
Neath an endless cobalt sky
Slid down smooth gray rocks
And tumbled to the beach
There, a logjam dragon woke
Tanka
582 · Feb 2016
Late February
sun in the alley
crocuses along the ditch
blue and white streaked sky
Haiku
579 · Dec 2012
Cold Clouds
Bright torn horizon
Silver and dark clouds converging
Some stretched, some piled high
Racing hard across the straits
To snow deep the waiting tors
578 · Jul 2016
Monster
fear is a monster
it destroys the intellect
and crushes the heart
it is the parent of hate
together they bring chaos
and mindless cruelty
Choka
576 · Oct 2015
Alone
cooked up spaghetti
and meatballs for my dinner
took it to the couch
no candlelight and wine
nor smiles and conversation
the meal was delicious but
i was not hungry
Choka
575 · Oct 2015
Disassembling
at first a few drops
becomes a raging torrent
bursting from my eyes
Senryu
573 · Jan 2016
Birds
aeolian day
birds swim the green ocean
that flows to and fro
Haiku
572 · Dec 2015
Will You
guided by the moon
on quiet feet at midnight
will you come to me
Senryu
568 · Oct 2012
A Gentle Hint
Nothing else matters
And there's just you and me here
Your touch is of silk
566 · Apr 2013
April Wind
Strong wind through the trees
Turning cherry blossoms to
Pink confetti clouds
That dance brightly within it
I tug my cap down and smile
tanka
557 · Sep 2012
The Mute
He talks with his hands
Fingers flutter and palms slap
Digits full of love
556 · Dec 2014
Regret
A clear icicle
Caught in the bright morning sun
Melting to teardrops
553 · Dec 2012
Up and Down
Yellow ochre clouds
Strumble across the dark sky
Scraping sawtooth peaks
A flash explodes, blinding me
I flee down the mountainside
Tanka
552 · Dec 2015
Spare Change
so many shoulds
and so many coulds
not many ares
Senryu
552 · Jan 2015
Worry
Inside of my head
There lives a sleek, fat maggot
I call him worry
He feeds on fear, guilt and shame
And I would love to starve him
Tanka
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