Category: Death & Afterlife
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Diego’s wife
a poem written to the prompt: Ashes. She hoped her exit would be joyful She hoped she’d never return She patiently waits at home on a shelf Because they will not let her leave He swallowed a mouthful of ashes Gathered the rest in red silk sash Placed them in an pre-Columbian urn And made…
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Tread lightly on the ground
People of the dust Walking clay Beneath your feet Your forbears mingle there Holding you up Breathing history into pores of clay feet 1-13-22 Last Friday, I wrote and read this poem at the Park Circle Gallery in North Charleston for the opening exhibition of work by Artist, Pascale Bilgis, called, ‘Little Flat People.’ The…
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haiku at the corner of Brandon Avenue & Landon Lane
sit still and listen while leaves discuss transcendence as they fall to ground 11-18-21
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haikus of autumn
before dawn shatters its lamp on the edge of the sky grey night shimmers blue sit in the half-light listen to leaves rattle death as they leap in air wheezing school bus and noisy garbage truck disturbs quiet solitude lined up side-by-side children and olive trash cans wait to be emptied dry cellulose leaves gathered…
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Innocent bystander
On a sidewalk where song only shakes stained glass Between breakfast and lunch on Sundays Rooted in the churchyard cemetery, hung over A brick wall built to keep out unbelievers A tree hands me a note on a blood red leaf Soul skeletons are attempting an escape Unwilling to be an accomplice to a prison…
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Ode to a garden spider
October night Congeals jelly spirit Do you sleep Or just slow down? Morning light warms Swollen joints and jaws Death shroud wrapped Night fliers Invade dreams Await brunch Go suck the juice Of living day 10-5-21
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haiku meditation of a dead branch awaiting rain
tired limb begs the rain to send Kevorkian winds end this dangling death 9-20-21
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poem for a friend
If you don’t die first grief will follow you Today, you think the lucky go first Tomorrow, you may think the lucky go last Either way death follows us all Turn around and embrace it 9-6-21
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3 haikus while meditating on friends old and new who are standing at the door or waving from the next room
in early morning before light gathers you in cast your shadow long long before it’s cold some leaves grow tired and lie down in the midst of green prayers for a friend bitter taste lingers on tongue a cup of dark roast 9-2-21