24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
Tax Day
once a year
their taxes are due
they come to me
receipts all askew
forms galore
they’re not sure
can I claim this
how about that
no sir, you cannot claim
your cat
aren’t’ my crumb crunchers
worth a bit more
please, help me tax lady
I’m paycheck poor
the path
the path
she ponders
glimmering before her
she must step through the shadows
of doubt
clutching her fear
glimpsing, on what
could be
words on poetry
Life is like a box of pizza
You never know which piece
Will burn the roof of your mouth.
My life is a ritual,
Living each moment in precise, calculated strokes
to avoid veering towards a path of misguided sanity.
Hipster Hiker Haiku
Name-brand everything:
green hat pants coat bag pack &
meticulous beard
(response to image prompt)
Running away from that
Which no longer serves me
Is the same as turning away
From everything I know to be true
And I can never stop running.
My skin is made of smoke
Floating among an abyss of stars
Falling from trees with hues of crimson and maroon,
white rays reflected in glittering
Waves, a sea of unknown tranquility.
Mystery, for Dave
When Dave didn’t die from the aortic aneurysm
like the eighty-five percent who do
he said Nancy, what does it even mean
to be alive? What happens when we die?
Does it matter how we live
if we’re just going to die?
I said Dave, when I tore my Achilles
I drove up a mountain
because I couldn’t walk
and I lay on a picnic table all night
to watch the meteors shower.
I said Dave, when I noticed a green anemone
in a tidepool surrounded by crushed white shell
I could see the pink-red outline
of each sticky tentacle.
I said Dave, the soil around madrona
always seems blacker than anywhere
and the flank of that tree stays cool in the sun.
I said Dave, how the yellow jacket
loves the overripe plum.
I said Dave, I don’t know.
I said Dave, the bison’s strong head
new-tattooed on your shoulder.
I said Dave, your fingertips
when you feel the potatoes for moisture
then roll out and turn over each lefse.
I said Dave, your delicious square grin
each time you come toward me open armed
for an enveloping hug—your squeeze
like the sweetest warm-risen dough.
I said Dave, you didn’t die from the aortic aneurysm
like the eighty-five percent who do.
I’m glad we’re alive.
Something happens when we
live. It’s a mystery.
(response to “mystery” prompt)
Love is delicate this is true.
Yet, it can be robust and life giving.
The best love though, iot is not a fabrige egg, gilded in gold and celuian adelusion blue.
Encrused in the finest diamonds rubies emeralds and sapphires. Whetern it be top tier or semi precious like the aquamaringes, peridots and garnets.
No the best love is not a diamond grade of paler shade of greayish blu.
It is found insted in a blue birds nest with spects of slightly broken stickand shards of green grass and moss tucked inbetwen.
That is the love that I seek.
This is the kind of love that makes me weak.
Haiku Not Mentioning Marriage
Morning tea. Thank God
I dodged that bullet train. Rice,
toasted, floats in green.