I know people generally like poets
to keep it short. The haiku form
is the logical extension of that.
It’s a rainy day in early spring,
chilly and dripping,
new green still spare,
splashes of yellow. I sit down
in a comfortable chair
with a good book
and fall asleep.
I am in heaven.
Basho could have caught
such a moment
in seventeen syllables.
Imagine going through life
talking like that.
But we don’t, and that is why
haiku seem so
profound, mysterious—
why they are poetry.
But another way
is to allow ourselves
a page or two, or three or four.
I am working on a new form,
the 500 syllable haiku.
A little more space
for interesting language.
Some vivid, accurate
description. Even the odd
beauty of digression.
I am far from perfecting it.
You can read just the last
three lines of my poems
if you prefer.
That might work.
Or, you can take the time
to read the whole thing.
Either way, short or long,
it’s the rounding of silence
after the words stop,
the feeling around them,
that really matters.