Tanka
a night
without love poems by my hand
is wasted
I murmur into her ear—
a quizzical look in her eyes
on the muddy
ground
he rocks to and fro with arms
wrapped around his knees…
the crime-scene tape
flapping in the winter wind
a ship
perched
atop forest branches...
I glimpse
the face of the Muse
in clichéd imagery
a
shooting star
streaking across the sky
loneliness
sneaks into my room
and mounts on my body
her parents arrive
at long last from China
as the moon shines
on her O-shaped mouth—
the monitor flat lining
winter gust
beating at the petals
of time
that swirl around us...
this starless night we meet
slanted
moonlight
on The Essential Basho...
the ancients follow
behind us in our thinking
and yet they come to meet us
my persona
knows
no boundary between states
as it moves across
the lines and pages—
Chinese poet in the attic
Taipei
101
an iconic glass tower
dominates
its misty landscape...
the homeless man looking high
clad
in lily-white
she sweeps into each room
and out again . . . .
the woman in my vision
remains a winter dream
(for Emily Dickinson)
