a vagabond's sketchbook

trash can chase

2012-02-02T00:23:00.027-05:00

It was the barking at first. Rather, it was the idle growling of my faithful companion, Astronomer, as I had given up waiting for the clouds to drift out after setting up my telescope on the front porch after supper to witness the four large moons of Jupiter in alignment. I could hear her rumbling fuse of a bark as I stood at the sink in the kitchen finishing off cold soup. And then it was a choking bark, like she was trying to talk faster than her brain would allow.

As I approached the front, there were those spinning lights, and the knocking from above, and I worried the porch overhang standing on three wobbly timbers would collapse onto poor Astronomer before she was done cursing.
Outside now, there was somebody...no, something in there, and I can't explain how a creature with two eyes(me) could make direct one-eye contact(it), but along with Astronomer's comments and my own one-eyed shotgun, 'It' bolted on two creaking stilts.

I had to shove Astronomer out of the driver's seat and reach down to the floorboard to retrieve the dropped keys a couple times before we could give full pursuit in my '71 Mercury Comet. We didn't exactly have piercing searchlights, and lost the escapee out in the dark, Astronomer not relenting in her opinion of the situation one iota as we sat in darkness with engine stalled and cold soup coming up.

You're the first one I'm telling, and I'd sure appreciate you not mentioning this to nobody.

image by Hervé

the juggler

2012-01-29T11:25:00.030-05:00

Five ball extraordinaire
no sharp knives no smoking torches
no fishnet flammable stockings, Love
no small terrified animals
fine print local code

Boomerang orbits beyond footlights
exit ticket booth trajectory
pigeon feather return
scalping tall pinze-nez men
fainting ladies hand to breast

The Times review!
birdcage trapdoor Arts section
yawning soggy cereal one inch column
third row tomato critic
splat

oil on canvas: Red Spot II (1921) ~Wassily Kandinsky (1896-1944)

haiku heart cure

2012-01-27T19:00:00.022-05:00

Moon and Venus dance
Tango medicine prescribed
Spiritual night cure

for Rebecca...get well soon, Love!
Five steps North, seven bread crumbs West, then five swift paces Southwest leads you to 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart photo of Moon and Venus by Tavi Greiner 1-24-12

pour

2012-01-22T10:49:00.015-05:00

'Coffee', he said, and somewhat relieved, face relaxed and shoulders hunched, she dropped the pad and pencil down into the over-sized pouch of her peach apron. She brought the saucer and cup, and only then did she pour the beautiful hot liquid. He leaned in, inhaling close to capture her dark scent. And she leaned back against the chrome counter, closed her eyes briefly, then opened them to watch the cup.
Three cubes of sugar. More cream than usual. Then some more when he followed her eyes. He looked down as she raised hers to his.
He smiled, and his face warmed as he turned the cup.
'Just like my women - sweet, pale,' and blowing across the top of the cup,'and lukewarm.'

From Boris Hoppek's Tokyo exhibit "Ever" Magpie 101 class meets on Sundays. Bring two pencils.

deep blue shoes

2012-01-16T18:33:00.020-05:00

Stone with marble-laced shoestrings
chocked loafers no faithful dog could bring
annoying leg discomfort symptom to bear
a bit less bothersome than gasping for air

sculpture by Jason deCaires Taylor

Heavens to Haiku

2012-01-13T21:41:00.021-05:00

Ancient catacomb
Mimosa scented passage
Knock softly, enter

photo courtesy: r.b. Five steps North, seven bread crumbs West, then five swift paces Southwest leads you to 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

you are precisely my cup of tea

2012-01-08T11:16:00.030-05:00

She stopped the cup at her lips.
'No', she laughed quietly under her breath, 'that's not Silent Cal'.
'Could be. He's not doing anything'.
She sipped. 'Statues aren't suppose to do anything'.
'That's my whole point. Have at'm pigeons'!
She smiled. That's what I wanted. Her smile, even lovlier than her eyes, fooling no one sitting opposite, the clean blue and white oil-clothed tea room table with generous street view, her face shadowed by a light blue ball cap that could not hide that she was definitely not a boy, over-sized gray t with black curve-revealing leggings darting out a black short skirt, and orange slip-on leather shoes.
'Why so stern'? she mused, small ring-less delicate hands turning her tea cup, red-lipped profile in the light now, looking up at the infamous Broadway poster across the street.
'Maybe he's not found true love', I said, carefully watching her face, hopeful. She looked at me quick, then down into her cup.
'Is it half full or half empty?' I asked barely audible, my mouth dry, longing for hers.
She twisted her mouth and closed one eye, schoolgirl now, pretending to rack her brain. I interrupted before she could answer.
'By the way - orange shoes'?
She spun in her chair and gave a precision Rockette kick, hat flying off to expose disheveled fair hair, slim waist exposed, her toe seemingly coming inches from the ceiling. Everyone in the joint applauded appreciatively, similar to an enthusiastic audience relieved at the conclusion of a three hour lecture on embalming.
'I love you.' My whole body seemed numb, helpless, as in a dream.
Her chest heaved, eyes sparkling and she glowed. 'I'm hungry.'

photo: Lee Friedlander 'Getting to know you, Putting it my way, But nicely, You are precisely, My cup of tea.' ~Oscar Hammerstein, Getting To Know You

Eve Arnold 1912-2012

2012-01-08T10:39:00.004-05:00

Eve Arnold

capture and release

2012-01-04T22:25:00.024-05:00

She summer drifted around the bend of the narrow river in a waterlogged rowboat at white cloud speed, ponderous as a slow winter sleigh ride, peered over starboard as she hoisted the brown paper sack of old love letters secured with black shoestring, pausing briefly to admire her reflection donning a floppy lake hat, smiling, then shoving it over the side, following its tumbling descent weighted by an unforgiving heart.
She sprawled back, laughing for no one to hear except a startled doe hidden amongst the trees, the toes of her right foot over the side creating cold foamy ripples against the current. Her eyelids became heavy and she slept, a wind gust overturning her hat and rippling her ginger hair. In the buoyant mist ahead she dreamed of her new lover. He could not spell her name, but oh could he kiss, and he loved to fish.

River, Marina Moevs, 2005

If you really want to hear about it...

2012-01-01T11:24:00.003-05:00

JD would've been 93 today.
Supposedly there are 15 more novels hidden somewhere.

two trees

2011-12-30T22:37:00.002-05:00

Alessandra Celletti
Paul Barton, piano

the girl with the laughing face

2011-12-26T17:11:00.025-05:00

You ask me now, I don't think she heard me 'cause she was laughing. Only got three quarters of the way through - she did not laugh like a horse, how wonderful - the teasing parable of the hurdling 100-year comet orbiting the Sun(it's meritorious tail presented to man, more beautiful than its face, through the lens for minute study) and striking the earth with such force to reveal its pearl core. And she was a hot exquisite result - including the tail. I looked at her and she was laughing, me too then, and I never got to say this: How she is rare, once in a lifetime for all mankind. But maybe it was good she did not hear. Besides, I don't think she ever laughed nearly as much as she wept.

MM by Bert Stern The Last Sitting (1962)

a midnight clear

2011-12-24T21:01:00.000-05:00

Savior's star above
Snow scape tolls silent footprints
Vagabond comfort

17 tracks in the snow for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of
Haiku My Heart

winter sketch

2011-12-19T22:22:00.022-05:00

I can cross the threshold, but angry shadows can not slip pass through the keyhole labyrinth. Savoring a kiss that steams up our glasses, two bookworms, we miss so much, except to remain embrace-ably warm before we take up our quills to dot another i. So, we clean our lenses and start over, in this drafty barn, a place to hang our hearts.

image: Lee Friedlander, 1966

fireplaced haiku

2011-12-16T20:36:00.028-05:00

Silent night's hearth blaze
Home's smokey blue moon-ward drift
Haiku my heart? Aye.

17 match strikes for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of
Haiku My Heart

swept away

2011-12-12T23:27:00.000-05:00

She placed the black stone in my hand - the kind found along a seashore, smooth from centuries of polishing waves. Tempted like a child, I wanted to skip it along the sparkling surface and follow it to the other side of the world. She laughed, 'go ahead, I want to die, don't you see?', and when I turned with my back to the open sea to respond to her outrageous game, she was gone. I spun around and heaved the beautiful disc as hard as I could with my eyes shut, little white splashes dotting the calm blue, the silent finish so melancholy.

A dry row boat appeared, bobbing ever so queasily, abandoned. No footprints except my own, hold it steady now, her body sprawled out in the bottom on a cushion of more smooth stones I felt compelled to heave, arms above her head, pale dead. I kissed her forehead twice, once for you since the boat had your name scrawled starboard, escorted the vessel knee-deep against the current and shoved it with my bare shoulder into the clouds. A solitary seagull circled above and laughed as I shivered in the cold ashore.

image by Mostafa Habibi

Venice shrine haiku

2011-12-09T21:08:00.021-05:00

Sons and daughters drawn
To Mary's loving aura
Beyond simple shrine

photo: Churches in Venice blog 17 syllables for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

quote of the day

2011-12-08T08:19:00.002-05:00

The artist’s life cannot be otherwise than full of conflicts, for two forces are at war within him [or her]—on the one hand, the common human longing for happiness, satisfaction and security in life, and on the other a ruthless passion for creation which may go so far as to override every personal desire … There are hardly any exceptions to the rule that a person must pay dearly for the divine gift of creative fire.

~Carl Jung (1875-1961)

english for beginners

2011-12-05T22:13:00.001-05:00

first hot meal

2011-12-04T16:33:00.029-05:00

I remember it was quiet, just in off the street, and we sat in a first-come first-serve shuffle, everyone in hard heels, strangers of brother and sisterhood, avoiding eye contact, but no matter, my mouth was hurting for food. It was a clean hall, and new, but dim lit. Everyone needed a bath, all dressed in ill-fitting salvation clothes, the men with top button fastened and straight ties. Silent, expressionless ladies served thick, square, slices from loaves in clear bags with no writing, and the best ever fried baloney with crisp edges slid off a spatula of a second lady server, the one nearest me had a hairnet, but no safety net for her hairy arms.
I felt a nudge on my right elbow and wanted to ignore it, but the man said excuse me barely above a whisper and I felt compelled to clear my throat and excuse him. Our eyes met quick and I could see he had been crying.
It was so quiet. Me too, 'cause I was saying grace the whole time. And then about two rows behind me a new man said he'd sure like some hot coffee.

painting: Lunch George Tooker, 1964

no ordinary heart

2011-12-02T22:58:00.000-05:00

Bundled hearts aloft
Wherever vagabonds roam
Burdens cast aside

painting: Madonna and Child by Adolphe Jourdan(1825-89) 17 syllables for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

happy 76th, Woody

2011-12-01T20:47:00.000-05:00

1971 The Dick Cavett Show

song of the day

2011-12-01T19:28:00.007-05:00

I love Gillian Welch's version of this old W.C. Handy classic, Make Me A Pallet On Your Floor. David Rawling's masterful playing tops it off nicely. Enjoy!

quote of the day

2011-11-28T22:23:00.005-05:00

Let my doing nothing when I have nothing to do, become untroubled in its depth of peace, like the evening in the seashore when the water is silent.

~Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)

black friday

2011-11-27T12:18:00.014-05:00

For Sale:Adorable moss-red patterned sofa. One family used. Cleaned of black petrified jelly beans, dried snot, crackers and ants. Checked for coinage. Coils intact. Cushion available. Slightly flared arm. Assemblage free. Eco-friendly. Works well in any decor. See: Bayhead bridge underpass. Best offer. Hauling not available.

photo: Christine Donnier-Valentin

one final leap

2011-11-25T19:31:00.014-05:00

Child in us all
Goodbye Autumn, pal o' mine
Drop, roll, cushioned crunch

16 steps and 1 dive into colored leaves for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

two-step sketch

2011-11-23T19:09:00.013-05:00

Slide guitar, the attention getter. At least now patrons look around thinking of hitting the floor. Thick eye-lidded drummer sleepily follows, 1 2 3 4, bringing down drumstick on top of the other on old worn snare drum. Bottles clinking occasionally in the key of B Flat, not on purpose, that dim neon place sound. The first couple rises, close and slow-sway anticipating. Harmonica beneath a brown cowboy hat accompanies, the silk brim adsorbing foot lights beautifully while accordion encourages two more mates. Singer leaves a full glass unmixed at the bar and strides two steps up to the microphone.

an actor's life

2011-11-21T23:17:00.001-05:00

It's rare that symmetry exists. If you're caught posing by any director worth their salt, they'll permeate your hide with pepper to make you sneeze out your lines off-kilter. If caught acting, as the understudy one notch above the ticket booth seller, you can go over and wait in line at the punch clock behind the sweaty set painter and in front of the yawning script girl. Make sure you get the inked time lined up with the square on the yellow card or you get shorted. And, as understudy, forget the mirror with a ribbon of light-bulbs, you get to apply leftover makeup glancing into the glass of a roadside starving artist's painting.

With a little luck, if you listen, if you conquer symmetry in all her glory, you'll get more right-angle kisses than you are entitled too in perpetual give and take, so much easier than eating fifty eggs in one sitting, Baby.

photo: Woodward & Newman

the clearing

2011-11-16T19:54:00.011-05:00

A light burns in the window in tribute to you, Dear Spadoman, and although the clouds hang low and heavy, and the view may be limited, a slight tilting of the heart and head hopefully will bring healing with many unobstructed views of sunrise on the horizon yet to come.

have a seat

2011-11-14T19:37:00.033-05:00

'This is Hugh Milton, Eyewitness News, reporting today from Farmland, in fields stretching out of sight of a Mr. Harry Garvin, grower of the only known crop of', looking back over his shoulder and shuddering.."chairs"'.
Camera pans out and shows Hugh, with Harry on his left.
'You are...as I understand it...the only one harvesting chairs in the Tri-State'?
'Yes, sir, that is'-
'Please speak up'. Hugh shows his big white new fake chopper smile looking into the camera twice.
'Yes, sir, that is correct, sir'. Harry turns and spits a beautiful arch of tobacco landing out of camera range.
'I guess you could say you are a "chaircropper"'?
Harry chuckles, wipes his glassy eyes. 'Oh, that's a good one, Hugh. I always liked you'.
Hugh grins eye-balling the TV camera, like looking into a light bulbed dressing room mirror combing his hair, missing manic direction to speed the interview along.
'Can't help it. It's how my mind works'. He doesn't know how to stop smiling, 23045 viewers are wondering. 'And tell us please, Mr. Garvin', his body swerving away from his camera transfixed head, 'how do the chairs grow'?
'Well..I..I..seed in the Spring, water, and there they be'.
Hugh, oblivious, marches on. 'And just who is that pretty young woman out amongst your crop'?
'What woman'?
'Her. There.'
Harry rubs his chin.'I don't know what you mean Hugh.'
'Her.'
'Sorry, Hugh.' Harry looks into the camera and shrugs. 'There is nothing out there except my chairs'.
Harry painfully stops smiling. People at home drop their dinner trays and lean forward...searching. Harry makes a cutting motion across his throat. The camera does not go off. A momentary silence and one last slit-eyed gaze into the fog-shrouded field.

***

This week's Tales Of A Magpie brought to you by The Acme Hearing Aid Company, innovators of the original detection-free hearing aid.

Vonnegut on his birthday

2011-11-11T21:51:00.014-05:00

"I'm not your destiny, or the Devil, either!" I said. "Look at you! Came to kill evil with your bare hands, and now away you go with no more glory than a man sideswiped by a Greyhound bus! And that's all the glory you deserve!" I said. "That's all that any man at war with pure evil deserves.

"There are plenty of good reasons for fighting," I said, "but no good reason ever to hate without reservation, to imagine that God Almighty Himself hates with you, too. Where's evil? It's that large part of every man that wants to hate without limit, that wants to hate with God on its side. It's that part of every man that finds all kinds of ugliness so attractive.

"It's that part of an imbecile, " I said, "that punishes and vilifies and makes war gladly."

from Mother Night (1961)photo by Dmitri Kasterine

11.11.11 haiku

2011-11-11T18:25:00.013-05:00

Eleventh hour
Veterans never at ease
Purple heart remnants

17 patriot syllables for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

bury it

2011-11-06T18:14:00.042-05:00

She decided at dusk was appropriate, and wearing a full length black coat, her face nearly stealth under hood, she pushed the loaded red wheelbarrow with balanced shovel along the muddy pasture lane past the cemetery wrought iron entrance, stopping only once to look if all remained quiet and clear in the windless path. She looked down and cursed the mud-splattered fringes of her coat and scraped goo off her vagabond shoes.

Past the all-clear she huffed it up an incline towards the back of the deserted grounds and halted short of the level wooden property line, falling to a seating position, spitting like an under-payed minor league third base coach. She knew about the minor leagues. She reached into the wheelbarrow, pulled out a moist sample in the pile of papers, and revisited a last line of one of many rejection letters:

...and cease all correspondence with our publishing properties with your 'horror' manuscripts that would send Poe yawning head first into his soggy porridge. May I make a suggestion, Miss Kavanaugh? - Take a shovel and bury it all in your backyard.

She had no back yard, only an uneven courtyard leveled with white rocks season after season. And up above a one room flat on the third floor of a leaning gray brick, one bed, one cracked mirror, a writing table with holes, a gold framed photo of a black magpie - a poor woman's Raven - and one drafty window chilling her ambitions. The muffled pounding of the shovel packed the circular mound of Earth in a hidden flowerless plot filled with plenty of double spaced prose for the dead to read forever more.

small children in waiting rooms

2011-11-05T14:30:00.004-04:00

They're like small town drunks aren't they? Weaving and indistinguishable speech, unable to focus on one object more than 2 seconds. Crying one moment, dried-eye the next and laughing.
Cute little drunks.

autumn haiku

2011-11-04T19:34:00.023-04:00

Sturdy branch wind chimes
Norther leaf ultimatum
Cool blaze of glory

photo: by yours truly (October 2006) 17 autumnal syllables for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

ghost writer

2011-11-01T21:53:00.039-04:00

He was totally blocked, staring at the next blank sheet, same to same, book deal money already blown on three wives and a pink waitress. Crumpled paper strewn about resembling giant radioactive dust balls bore indecipherable sentences of black letters hammered with weighted fingers like mallets at a carnival strongman game with bell ringing not as a winner, but signaling each lousy break.

He stepped outside for fresh air, catching instead the drift of burning leaves tended over the blue hills from Willow Manor, reminding him of his childhood burrowing, his gaunt magpie-beaked grandfather raking the fallen October colors into mounds, and down on all fours he remembered the cushioned tumble, springing up laughing, and seeing the old man, not too bright, using gasoline to fuel the flame two piles over, the flame following the trail back to the gas can, exploding in the old man's hands, the old guy rolling in agony setting fire to the next mound of leaves. Helpless, the boy screamed in silence with time stopped like a famous painting. So much for a whiff of fresh air.

He stood behind the chair and blinked twice, his widened disbelieving red eyes focused on the fingerless typing. The typing was steady, no hesitation, the keys pounding away like the old news wire service teletype on pale yellow paper in his AM radio gig years coldly stating that Bobby was dead way out in California.

He leaned closer, put on his glasses and read outloud to the cat, 'Why my little grandchild did you just stand there why did you not help you could have thrown me into the well to put me out why why why you see my hands are still good you fool!'

a clear midnight

2011-10-29T19:18:00.009-04:00

This is thy hour O soul, thy free flight into the wordless,
Away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson done,
Thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the themes thou lovest best,
Night, sleep, death and the stars.

~ Walt Whitman

badge 714

2011-10-23T20:59:00.045-04:00

This is the city.
A densely packed metropolis teeters delicately between those that keep their noses clean, and the honkers out to cheat, steal, and spit out mucused mayhem. And sometimes it boils down to plain old murder. When it gets serious that's where I come in.
I carry a badge.
It was overcast. We were working the day watch out of Homicide. My partner is Frank Smith. The Captain, Mort Welch.
My name is Friday.

Captain Welch strode up to the desk opposite where Frank had one bite of a pink cream donut and was about to take another but stopped when he saw the pale, hollow-eyed stare of our commander. I knew it was bad. A call came in about a woman found dead in the Sandstone Tower Apartments, and smothering my cigarette out into the pink donut in my ashtray, we headed out.

The death scene was on the seventh floor. The coroner was just departing as we got off the drafty elevator.
'Charlie'.
'Frank'.
'Joe'.
'Charlie. What'ya got'?
'Stangled'.
'Time'?
'Hour. Maybe hour and a quarter'.
'Thanks. You done'?
'Yeah'.
I lit a cigarette. We halved the floor and started pounding doors. All deaf and blind except when eying the peep holes. Typical. At the end of the hall I looked down from the window near the fire escape and saw the silent ambulance roll sadly away. I felt a tap on my shoulder, and turning faced an inebriated man, whiskey-glass eyed, blinking close nose to nose, then back peddling away into the dark. Top heavy, he staggered close again.
'Silv silver 4 Door'.
'What'?
'Down alley see', he pointed.
'What about it, sir'?
'Scratchy scratchy', as he pantomimed clawing to the face. 'That be his'. Charlie did mention to Frank the corpse had messy fingernails, most likely battling death with swipes at the attacker.
'Are you implying the man that owns that 1974 Ford Sedan has scratches on his face'?
'Ding ding ding youse can have anything from the top row'.

Frank yawned in our fourth hour watching the suspect vehicle. He was doing pretty good up to then, but those donut stomach rumblings can be the start of something bad. Then, in our sixth hungry hour, events hurled in slow motion. A man in a red hooded sweatshirt jumped into the Ford and was off. We had the advantage since narrow alleyways permeate all twelve buildings of Sandstone place, leaving little clearance. The chase was on. Topping speeds of eight miles an hour, we rode the Ford's bumper, slowing to maybe four but not quite five on sharp-edge turn after turn, the Ford sparking sideview mirrors against trash bins, parked cars, a fire escape landing pole, nudging a screeching bag lady who fisted off a souvenir sideview mirror for her collection, and finally ramming into a black and white with red silent lights with visibility of maybe fifteen yards on a clear day.
The suspect bolted from his dual side-scratched car and sidled in between a brick wall and the police cruiser trying to run away, but Frank managed to squeeze off one 38 special round nose, all 158 grains of it, boring into red hood's calf going a heck of a lot faster than eight miles an hour.

photo: Lee Friedlander from America by Car

he's resting

2011-10-21T20:49:00.002-04:00

Is Colonel Gaddafi really dead?
Or is he just resting?

world ended today

2011-10-21T19:25:00.009-04:00

Day of reckoning
Waited, watched, phonies alarm
Great Pumpkin, tell me

decoy

2011-10-19T23:22:00.017-04:00

Enjoy Trick or Treat, from 1952 in place of my awful poem.

the little folk

2011-10-15T11:45:00.025-04:00

I figured something was off-kilter when I saw two presentable rows of mice standing with silver swords raised along the side of the fridge. The side displaying a prized miniature magnet resembling a shopping cart holding this weeks grocery list.
"Those are silver toothpicks".
"Oh. You're a mind reader".
"No, I followed you eyes," he nodded.
"Suppose I push your belly. Will you giggle too?"
"I, Sir, will have your head clean lopped off."
"Yeah". I was the one that giggled.
"Sir, do not try me."
I straightened up in my chair like a faithful servant.
"I, too, My Lord, have a special talent."
"Oh?" The tubby visitor seemed mockingly perplexed.
"Stand still. With a clean jerk of the morning news you shall, My Lord, remain standing. But preferrable, Dear King, arch safely across the moat into the garbage disposal."
"Off with your head!"
I laughed as my head rolled off the table, traversing across the linoleum, halting in an upright position against the wooden cabinet where I store green trash bags, and a nighttime home to a family of mice. Look at that mote.

illustration ~ The Little King by Michael Sowa

late for the ball

2011-10-12T19:41:00.042-04:00

We arrived by train to that Midwestern town somewhere in line with the Autumnal Equinox and the loveless Harvest Moon, to be enthralled by the kindness of the lady dressed like a well kept grave. On cue, always ready like all the other stops along our way, we were shoved off the train by a bull with a splintered stick, two vagabonds, the girl deserving of a hot shower and a warm meal. A hot meal sounded pretty good to me too. A man in a ill fitting coat living under the crumbling town bridge gave us directions to the Manor, telling us of the Gracious Lady, and to knock four times at the back door.
We peeked in a window of the dining room before going around back. It looked like something out of a 1940's sound stage and we saw her sitting at the head of the table by herself sipping from a tiny cup with a look of absolute chore-less joy on her face. The girl guessed we were just in time, after all, as muffled dance music washed around every room we peeked in. In the square light shining out into the dark from one room we surveyed, where we stood in some flowers, I could see the girl was crying she was so happy watching a fairy tale. It was always hard to tell since her long hair usually fell over her eyes and she was constantly pushing it back. I brushed it back once and she hit me with all her might with a solid left fist, but she was playing. She has a beautiful mane, but she sure could use a shower.
We knocked four times, she opened the door unhesitatingly, we could hear yelling in a foreign tongue behind her, probably too many cooks in the kitchen like the old saying goes. She looked down at both of us standing three steps up in a fluffy red feather gown, the girl scared, burying her face in my chest shivering, said wait just a minute she'd be back, and before you knowed it she came back with two plates full of the best food we ever ate. Everything was as soft and good and warm as poached eggs we had once two weeks ago at a lunch trailer. Only better. I showed the girl how to make a sandwich with two biscuits and she copied me, seeing how she always followed my example.
Then something strange happened. We saw that feathered lady watching us out the back door window twice, and she would disappear and show again. Then she opened the door, sorrowful looking, and took the girl by the hand before she was done eating and slammed the door. I didn't know if maybe she was going to make her clean up the dishes or what and I got nervous. So I ate some more. But you know what? She came back about forty-five minutes later, it was getting cold out, about the time I'd finished up some tasty chocolate swirly goo, and that lady in red had given the girl the prettiest egg-colored gown to wear and her mane was shiny and flowed like a waterfall and she turned all the way around shy like for me, twice I asked, and I swear I tried not to cry she was so beautiful.
Later, as the Sun was rising and we hopped a slow moving freighter, she said she saw a dish on fire and that's what all the yelling was about.

Willow Manor Balls past: 2008 2009 2010

small talk

2011-10-05T19:23:00.025-04:00

She poured his coffee and he sipped it, holding the hot green-swirled porcelain in both hands.
She could not see his eyes under his dipped flat black fedora as he raised the cup, both elbows on the Eat Here! lunch counter. But he nodded, and she thought all was well.
Her back was turned, busy wiping the back counter, and he looked up and said, "good." She looked over her left shoulder, smiled just a bit, and she mouthed the word, "good."
A man in a business suit walked in and sat at the opposite end of the counter and she waited on him, pencil at the pad ready. He sipped more coffee and thought he heard her laugh, but looking at her didn't think she looked too happy at a distance just the same as close up with those hunched shoulders. Melancholy, he surmised. He lit a cigarette. She may be drowning in it, he feared.
The business man was deep in french fries and studying the Wall Street Journal when she came back around again to an emptied coffee cup.
"Worried"?
"Yes," she replied, pouring coffee from a steaming carafe.
"About?"
She was quiet for about twenty minutes and he thought she appeared more hunched than humanly possible. And he thought maybe she had been weeping, her eyes shining. It was getting dark and the yellow street lights topped with black iron points began to glow bright.
"I worry about the little birds," she said just above a whisper as she wiped the dry counter in front of him with a clean white rag.
"Oh." He paused, took off his fedora and set it in the seat next to him. "Well, I wouldn't worry. After all, the elephants are flying south."
She smiled, and he thought maybe he'd saved her just as she was being washed out to sea. "No," she pondered, playing along, "I think more to the northwest."

Jim Croce

2011-09-30T21:44:00.015-04:00

He died 38 years ago today after the plane he chartered clipped a singular pecan tree at the end of a runway in Natchitoches, Louisiana, following a concert. 5 others on board, including his accompanist Maury Muehleisen, also perished.

Jim and his melodies were a big part of my life. I played his albums almost every day after school. I even had a blue denim workman's shirt like he always wore on album covers and in concert. Fascinating - a man in a work shirt with 'Cat' emblazoned on it singing tender love songs.

Some criticized his songs for being so short, but he responded by explaining he was an admirer of....you guessed it....Haiku. Really.

Americana
Songs of love and remembrance
True original

For more haiku, visit the wonders at 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart.

the girl

2011-09-28T22:36:00.035-04:00

She was vagabondias specularis, an elusive species, a reluctant homecoming queen back in high school, voted Most Likely To Wander The Road Not Taken, the coed that crept through my dorm window in that freshman orange October to choose one of my flannel shirts, as she said it felt like a mans flesh against her goose pimples. She'd don my coke-bottle glasses to perform her take on our Philo prof, Mr. Ginsburg, lisps and palsy twitches, and I'd applaud at the blurry figure through the special effects lens of blindness and she'd take a sweeping bow, her long Audrey Hepburn hair brushing the stage.
I loved her, and she constantly worried about me. She was the only person I let call me Phillip, it thrilled me each time she said it as nobody knew my name. And I loved buttoning up the flannel and loosening her mane from the collar. When the zealous dorm monitor with the buzz haircut got wind and sniff that a real live vagabondias specularis had invaded our forbidden hall, he'd go around pounding on the doors, and when he reached mine she'd lower her voice and respond, 'so right here, move along now.' We'd hold our breaths, hardened criminals, and after the all-clear we clutched each other tight all night by the frost air of the open window, campus sidewalk lights brilliant below. We'd rise early on Saturdays, knockout our studies on the deserted second floor of the library, then have the entire weekend plus Mondays carefree. Eventually we drifted away from each other, she ever restless, seasonal colors seeped down the drain, no birds in sight, and there was her smiling face on flyers tacked to telephone poles, but I knew she was just fine as she came out into a clearing at the end of the World.

as long as I'm dreaming

2011-09-22T20:04:00.034-04:00

A hint of thunder approached within earshot, and along with black coffee, promised uninterrupted sleep. But gray clouds disintegrated and a full silver moon floated above the peaceful valley illuminating the blanketed night sky.
A train with a million graffiti-ed cars trudged along the gravel road crossing at nine miles an hour, and nodding off I dreamt abandoning my car, hopping the train like Kerouac in slow motion and watching time come to a stop.
There was a singular flag-marked grave at a cemetery along the way, a grass-less resting place of our small town's only eighteen-year old boy taken by a road side bomb from a country on the other side of the universe. He is next to his grandfather, also forever eighteen after perishing in the war to end all wars. It all reminded me in my doze that I needed to bulldoze all monuments dedicated to any war.
A dark stranger sporting a snake blocked the cemetery gate not allowing me to enter. I could not tell at first if the snake was smiling at me or just looking forward to the next meal. I guess it's all the same. In a snake's eye I'm guessing I looked like a juicy three swallow gazelle. I eliminated the middleman and blurted out to the fangy creature that I could converse with magpies. Boy, that changed the eight-footer's expression, like it just mistakenly got billed for filet mignon after only having toasted cheese and soup at a crowded lunch counter. So confused, it snapped off the silent stranger's neck. Luckily, chatty magpies are a snake's nemesis, and I didn't mind all the talk as we circled the courthouse square tower, the bell signalling that time started once again.

dream rendered by The Snake Charmer ~Henri Rousseau 1907

simple gifts haiku

2011-09-16T19:59:00.011-04:00

Pure nostalgic heart
Acoustic songs, timeless jokes
Campfire huddle

Ye Olde 5-7-5 scribbled for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart.

the horror of willow manor

2011-09-12T22:47:00.025-04:00

Do not be alarmed. I must tell this story to someone. I am from the dead. Perhaps, yes, I am familiar to you. I have that kind of face. It was the lightning strike through the open north window here. Not that a closed window would've helped. Or maybe being flung head first into the wall as you can see by the damage. That really set her off even though smoke was still pouring from my ears. In a flash it was all over for me, and now I stand before you amongst the horror.

She wanted this vestibule to the Manor ballroom painted in time for the soiree. Soirée. A word I never used before taking one to the temple. She was firm. Make the paint dry fast, she said. I'd like to paint your clock, I says under my breath. You think, Lady, that with a scorched soul I can perform miracles? Returning from the Dead is no miracle. It's a curse.

I'll show her. I'll haunt this place once I vaporize for good. Slam doors while she's painting her toenails and she'll have streaks to her knees. Piling furniture into a corner. That's straight from the manual. Oh yes, there's a manual. It was inside that portal of the Manor frame. There must be other Dead on the property. I'll keep it in my back pocket. 1001 Tricks For The After Hours. I better go now. My left hand tends to fall off. Makes holding the roller quite difficult. The horror of this place is coming. That brisk heavy traipse. I highly doubt if she'll offer a plate of diagonally sliced egg salad sandwiches and a tall frosty lemonade.

painting: The Revenant (1949) ~Andrew Wyeth

nine eleven haiku

2011-09-09T20:29:00.029-04:00

Out of pristine blue
Two darts pierce proud country's hearts
Gasps to grasping hands

surviving pear tree recovered from 2001, ground zero replanted at 9/11 Memorial site photo by Amy Dreher17 heartbeats etched for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart.

storm goods

2011-09-04T18:12:00.027-04:00

For Sale: Cast iron kitchen sink planted in acreage with tiniest storm damage. Solid picnic table top. Legs probably over in next county. Find them they are yours. Also: one truck tire. Excellent tread! Free if you haul away yourself (Bring shovel and hydraulic jack). Any offer. Everything must go.

it's all yours, shorty

2011-08-29T00:27:00.025-04:00

Oh, the ridiculousness of it all. To lose the business in a poker game. The shame seeps out of my pores as thick as water pours from a rat-clogged downspout. I give the fat little man the deed to my life up to now, exit by a color-drained alley, hiding my embarrassment with a dry umbrella like a neurotic movie star dodging flashbulbs sneaking out for a sack of donuts, and ride away on a stolen bike used only once by a humorless hair-bun widow carrying a little trembling dog in a wicker basket. Squeak squeak squeak.

Red Umbrella ~Christopher Shay

foolish heart haiku

2011-08-26T22:02:00.009-04:00

Old heart sinking spell
Foolish adolescent love
Some just never learn
17 unadorned syllables in white for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

happy birthday, Doris

2011-08-23T00:38:00.005-04:00

She's a triple threat.
She sings. She acts. She writes music. She's a devoted daughter, sister, wife and mother. Wait. That's four more. A total of seven. What's that called? No, wait. Make it eight....

She's a beloved friend.

The Very Thought Of You ~Nat King Cole

what's so funny? Oh.

2011-08-21T18:07:00.010-04:00

Usually dapper
Mr. sartorial starch
Forgot his britches

ambition

2011-08-15T20:23:00.038-04:00

The father finally got the boy to eat breakfast before bustin' out the screen door each morning for school. Now there was that aggravating spoon scraping against the breakfast bowl of corn flakes resembling a muffled blacksmith nailing shoes. The dog didn't mind the sound. It was a welcome call to sit and unblinkingly stare up at the boy by his kitchen chair waiting for soggy leftovers in yellow milk.

The father sat down opposite. A handwritten note before him from a teacher detailed a lack of seriousness in the boy's performance. The blacksmith fell silent when he saw the letter and the father's sorrowful eyes gazed at him. The dog stood on all fours as the boy lowered the leftovers.

'Let me tell you, son', he started in lecture mode. He stopped and hunched his shoulders, leaned back and spoke softly instead.
'There is a wholeheartedness that we all must possess to get by in this life, my boy. Suppose Washington had fidgeted about The Crossing and claimed "Yeah I was gonna do that yesterday but", or if Revere had tacked a handbill on a cork board at a ladies auxiliary arts and crafts meeting mentioning three paragraphs down a foe is approaching, or you've heard of great actors phoning it in, suppose Olivier had recited flowing Shakespeare in a cracking voice from his friendly local gas station phone booth, or a yawning Van Gogh lopping on a streak-less night sky with a roller'.

A yellow school bus squeaked to a stop outside. The boy shifted in his chair.
'Or Amelia Earhart. Suppose she only daydreamed of flight as she arched paper airplanes across the classroom that dropped into floor vents forever lost'.

The boy stood. He looked forward to school now. No airplanes, rather spitballs to be launched and adorning a vaulted ceiling, something he did wholeheartedly. And Tatyana, the girl in overalls, hair the color of straw rubber-banded to a ponytail, large birthmark on right cheek making her a target for torment, would smile at him, a fellow misfit.

He looked back once at the front door as the bus gear-striping grudgingly pulled away. The father waved four fingers like a talking sock puppet without the benefit of a sock with two black eyes painted on. The dog sighed deeply, still so hungry.

solace

2011-08-12T21:09:00.019-04:00

Dose of medicine
Sad songs peel back hidden blues
Lost heart healed anew

photo: Central Park musician by Petrit (2008) 17 notes played for a little sonata known as 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

my shining hour

2011-08-09T18:55:00.040-04:00

Remember all those summer-kissed nights? When I held your hand quickly climbing the stairs to the balcony at the Old Theater for heart pounding solitude but we actually watched all those old films instead? Remember, that one, Public Enemy, and how we both Cagney-speaked back at the screen, and in the end we froze at how he met his end? We'd sit there unaware the air-conditioned morgue-of-a-theater was empty, and exiting out into the close quiet-street nights, damn, how those yellow aisle lights illuminated your luscious movie star legs.

When I spun that Coltrane album, I remember the faces you made when you didn't get it, his sound, but you do recall how My Shining Hour made you rise slowly and the way you simmered about, your hips, even your fingertips lit up? You took it home. And once I stood underneath your window, watching your shadow dance performance for the ages behind those thin curtains, and your mom walked in and caught you. And when dogs barked I ran, not seeing you for a long time, and she sold that worn Coltrane for ten cents at a yard sale to give to kids who'd never eaten in their lives, and you cried when you told me, but I kissed those tears dry.

And whenever I took you home, those long goodbyes on your front porch resembling first-time hellos? Hello. Remember your old man - hell, that same song and dance - how we instinctively knew he was peeking, and sure enough, if a certain amorous young man circled within ten feet of you he played lighthouse keeper and flipped on that damn light bright enough to startle that Russian dog orbiting above?
I do.

Painting: Summer Evening ~Edward Hopper

woman reading

2011-08-05T20:11:00.023-04:00

Whispered immersion
lovely damsel rapt in words
fluttering heart prose
5 by 7 by 5. Follow those paces with a flashlight and sidekick and you'll find the little hidden treasure known as 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart photo: Marilyn Monroe by unknown

windmill ghost

2011-08-01T19:02:00.020-04:00

Fury windmill chase
Cornered wooden clockwork gears
It's alive!...demise
Old Wind Mill photo by Skip Hunt.

patterns

2011-07-29T21:02:00.015-04:00

Pattern of life's lines
Not an infinite science
Go fork cherry pie
Tree Section Detail ~Ansel Adams 1902-1984 After you finish your slice, hurry over to 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

astronomy 101

2011-07-26T00:02:00.000-04:00

I kissed her right shoulder.
'And that would be Betelgeuse'.
She laughed. 'Oh, go on'.
Our vagabond bicycles rested against a splintered post, up beyond a country road at a dirt bike path to a pasture lane on an unexpectedly warm early April, hidden from the glare of city lights, lost from civilization, an abandoned 1954 dog-eared Guide To The Night Sky and red-lensed flashlight at our feet. Millions of firefly's hearts pulsed so far out of reach from horizon to moonless horizon.
'Pay attention now', I playfully scolded, 'Orion will disappear quickly'. I wrapped her waist and pulled her close. 'And your waist is the belt of Orion'. The cyclist in tangerine bike shorts did not resist.
'Where?', she whispered up under my chin.
'Up there', and she followed my lofting gaze, 'three stars in a row, see?'
'Yes, I see'.
'And follow those three down, and you have Sirius, the dog star, most brilliant of them all'. She held me tight, becoming the hunter of a grateful and surrendering prey.
'The belt is tied to the dog'.
'Nice'. I kissed her. 'Couldn't have stated it better. I am the dog'.

alone again

2011-07-24T20:27:00.011-04:00

Edward Hopper's, New York Movie (1939), my second favorite painting of his, a shade below Gas (1940).

Perhaps she’s softly reciting the dialogue, imagining herself on screen.
And then I lose my footing and stumble down the steps shattering her solitude.

late

2011-07-23T11:02:00.013-04:00

Missed Friday haiku
Wheel fell off Life's old buggy
Cold tea morsels left

Don't let your carriage turn back into a pumpkin and hurry over to 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

tale of long ago, part II

2011-07-19T23:47:00.001-04:00

tale of long ago.....I will tell you now....

I will tell you now. You are here, I am glad. And there is the infamous mask upon the wall. Did you bring spirits? I am dry. Would you like a smoke? Sit down. No. Here, by the fire, aye.

The ruck sack you carry reminds me. She pried diamonds off her tiara and gave them to my men that rowed below. One each. A diamond - worth a King's ransom mind you - tins of beef, a compass, clothes if needed. All tucked into a sack and rewarded to men covered in soot and sweat as thanks for her safe return. You don't have a bottle in there, you're sure? Fine fine, well.

We separated once she was home. No diamond for me. Just a firm handshake from that waif, she turned and ran. Remarkable girl. I was ordered to replenish the injured Knightley, and to head South, aye, to war that Spring. The swift seas took us quickly to the shore of African savages. Ugly, horrible battles. Spears were to be no match you would think, but those iron-like points shattered some of my best men and vessel alike. The Knightley splintered and is, I believe, a ghost underwater that guards us all.

Before a second and third ship arrived I regrouped my men into selfless warriors with indomitable courage. They became the savages. Determined and stalwart, fine men. Only one week of fierce battle and we were at the island door of the Black Palace. You should have seen his eyes. Beyond surprise, aye. His final expression as my first mate pierced his heart with one violent swoop. They all cheered. I remember only swallowing hard. Aye, the mask was whisked away. Cushioned in straw, crated, and sent home. Let me relight my pipe.

Two more years at sea. No battles, save for a minor skirmish with desperate pirates from time to time. Pesky, but only hungry, aye. Then, to replenish stores, we returned to Malta for three days. By chance I overheard a conversation about...her. A summer home of her grandfather rises above a tree line. Easy to spot. I took a carriage. He was hard of hearing. Guess he thought I was there as the new horseman. Waved me away to the barn and slammed this huge wooden door in my face. I walked stern and peered into a crystal window.

She had her pinky raised with four or five other ancient women, their pinkies up, sitting at a round table. Small tea cups with a black cake at center. This waif that sliced the head off in battle with pools of blood. Her pinky raised with a child's tea cup at her lips. White gown, her hair still short like the last time, shining black eyes. Absolute 100 proof beauty. I tapped on the window. They all turned, pasty white and baggy-eyed bored. She turned and reddened, eyes downcast. Waved me away like the old guy. I moved away and walked into a shadowed arbor, sat on a bench and waited, just knowing, aye.

'You,' she said, like wind amid the lush trees. And then she was there, in the clearing, her white dress waving in the breeze just like the Knightley's sail. I rose, bowed, and she lowered her nose and was no longer a princess. We sat, opposite ends. I looked at the scar above her left eyebrow. She turned her head purposely so I might get a better view. And she smiled.
'I prayed.'
'The old man hired me to whisper at horses.'
'What?'
'Nothing.'
A call echoed from the house: 'Maria! Mareeeeeeuhhh!'
Maria. All these years. I never knew. It made me shiver in excitement. Maria. She nervously rose, started away, turned back to me hand outstretched. I grasped it to never let go.

It was in the tower. A brilliant room with a bay window view of the world. On the wall. I dropped to one knee, we were still holding hands, and was about to pull her hand to my lips. She took the mask in both hands and lowered it onto my head.
I could hear the sea, or maybe she was laughing.

loss

2011-07-15T19:51:00.002-04:00

Huge storm thrown off course
Eyepiece magnifies heart break
Oceans divide us
Visit happier moments out West at 'recuerda mi corazon', exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

five

2011-07-13T21:40:00.002-04:00

Created the old sketchbook five years ago tonight. Some things changed. Some things stayed the same. I can still only juggle 3 balls. I tried 4 but messed up and it rolled into another dimension behind the couch.

It has been fun filling in a white screen with letters bunched up together. I guess it's true. You know - you get a monkey typing and eventually you come up with something. Mostly magpies and haikus from the heart.

A special Hoosier Thanks(that's where I look down at my ragged shoes and mumble 'gosh, thanks')to all who've wandered into the sketchbook and have been so kind and encouraging and gracious with comments.

And now, a short, rather dour, musical selection, Impossible, representing how I really look at Life...

new lake hours

2011-07-12T19:02:00.020-04:00

People of Chilmark
Thomas Hart Benton, 1920

Row Boat Rental*
Adults: $5.00
Children: $2.00
Under 12: Free!
*shoes must be worn. used bowling shoes not allowed. life preservers must be worn. only 2 to a boat. no standing in boat. no feeding water-faring animals. not void wherever Chilmark may be. no racing. no rocking of boat. no circling or facing backwards. no leaping from boat to boat or boat into water. no swinging or lashing of oars. customer responsible for broken oars except for killing of attacking rabbits. small children must wear goggles. owner not responsible for missing children. I truly believe she murdered her little girl. closed at dusk.

sunny sunny night

2011-07-06T07:24:00.001-04:00

His world accorded
painted by ear
impatient brush strokes
bearing true light and shadow
in an unbearable world

Wheat Field with Rising Sun ~Vincent Van Gogh, 1889

a june bug july

2011-07-03T19:46:00.020-04:00

With July gaining speed to fly, tearing away the pencil scrawled month of June from the calendar on the wall, my thoughts just naturally drifted to blue flight and a postcard from paradise of sorts, of the infamous Albany Flier, piloted by Glenn Curtiss 103 years ago, the first flight in the USA traveling one kilometer.

And Flight always reminds me of composer Michael Kamen's lifting end theme to From The Earth To The Moon.

Close your eyes and just soar:

freedom haiku

2011-07-01T21:29:00.001-04:00

World clarion call
Tolling hope to all oppressed
Bursting liberty

From the land of amber waves of grain, Peace to all at 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

vacation

2011-06-27T20:53:00.036-04:00

The man impatiently tapped four fingers upon the wooden desk, simulating the steady beat of a drum. A torn and faded Jamaica 4 Days 3 Glorious Nights! poster duct-taped on the wall over his left shoulder seemingly dripped like a leaky faucet. He stopped, fished a pocket watch out of his sweaty vest, opened and over-wound it, and purposely snapped it's tarnished lid shut.
'And so, no cruises, no Icelandic bobbing, no breezing along the Champs Elysées for you, heh?
'It's just that we want something different.'
He close his eyes. 'Yes, yes, of course, as you were.'
He leaned back, and looking up saw that actually there was a dark spot on the drop ceiling from the upstairs commode.
'Something completely different.'
He looked at her. 'How about the Accountant's Hall Of Fame, in dear old Bellfontaine?' Oh, the sarcasm was in fine four-finger fashion now.
'Nope. Two summers ago. When our youngest was still living at home.'
'It's a souvenir bonanza. Pencils galore. Worth a second adventure.'
'No.'
'The Big Top Circus in Kalamazoo?'
'No, I don't believe so.'
'Nineteenth Century Magpie Sculptures of Willow Manor?'
'Oh no.'
'The Snooze Napping Museum in Rochester?'
'What?'
'A riveting display of colorful floating hammocks.' He was looking up at the ceiling splotch again. 'Riveting.'
'Yes. I believe that'll do nicely. My husband would like that.'
'Indeed.' He yawned. 'Fine.'

haiku heart salutation

2011-06-24T21:09:00.016-04:00

Window to summer
One orbital grand tour
My heart remembers

A tribute to Rebecca, for letting me play the three-line home version of 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

brief musical interlude

2011-06-20T21:54:00.021-04:00

Back lit solitude
Concert under two dollars
Played in 4/3 time

Elmer Bernstein To Kill A Mockingbird (Main Title)

haiku by sea

2011-06-17T21:21:00.000-04:00

Borealis quest
Sturdy sailboat built for two
Shaggy pal o' mine

photo: courtesy google images And, as always, the symmetrical 5-7-5 captured in a tradewind bound for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

shell gypsy

2011-06-13T23:28:00.008-04:00

By the shore she sells
Shell out crest of ear to hear
Distant woodchucks chuck

quote for today

2011-06-12T15:10:00.004-04:00

There is something in the human spirit that will survive and prevail, there is a tiny and brilliant light burning in the heart of man that will not go out no matter how dark the world becomes.

~ Leo Tolstoy

the call

2011-06-10T19:43:00.020-04:00

Raise the support beam
Caring neighbor foundation
Mansion of kind hearts

photo courtesy Shorpy.com And, as always, all 17 syllables hammered with dowels in place for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart.

close call

2011-06-07T08:31:00.002-04:00

'Yer out!' One wrong word from category F and the disbelieving runner is given the heave-ho. He brushes his soiled pants and offers three words from category SOB.
The manager scoots his beer belly across the diamond, reluctantly leaving his crackerjacks on top of the bench in the dugout, accompanied by the stadium organist's William Tell Overture blasting through all fourteen park speakers. The organist never misses a pitch, play, or belch.
'He was safe,' Charlie says calmly, catching his breath.
'Nope, Charlie.'
'Yer blind and need to schedule an appointment with a certified optometrist right away.'
The Ump, Milton, points to the official scorekeeper in the press box, then to Charlie, and the thumb goes up. 'Yer, outta here.'
'Already?'
'Yep.'
'Why, Milton?' Milton turns his back.
'Can't we discuss it? Milton? Milton? Can't I even kick up some infield dirt like old Leo Durocher first?'
Milton looks at him.
'Now there was a great manager.'
'He missed the tag.'
'I remember Leo.' Milton rubs his chin and smiles.
'Here. He wasn't tagged. Look at me. I'm kicking dirt.'
'Go right ahead. The organ player will accompany you in mere moments.' Looney Tunes echoes out, mocking Charlie.
'Geez, Charlie, I thought they liked you here in your own home town.'
'I thought they did too. I'm not done kicking dirt, Milton.'
'You'll have to leave us now, Charlie.' Two more umpires wander over.
'He was safe.'
'I'm not going to argue with you.'
The organist begins playing Three Blind Mice. The crowd politely applauds. The Ump points to the right of the press box where the pipe organ resides and ejects the organ player. All is silent except for scattered booing. There is no more music. The organist gathers up his sheet music into a black folder, some papers spilling out like squishy tomato from a decked ham sandwich, folds his spectacles, puts on his raincoat on this beautiful evening, descends six flights of cement steps, gets in his car, revs it up, and drives away weeping.

vegetable gentleman

2011-06-03T21:24:00.018-04:00

Market troubadour
True falsetto morning cry
Nuttin' rhymes with orange

photo: Center Market, 1922, Washington, D.C. credit: Shorpy.com And, as always, all 17 syllables squeezed to check ripeness for 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

songs my mother taught me

2011-06-03T00:56:00.002-04:00

~ Joan Sutherland (1961)

quote for today

2011-06-01T19:23:00.009-04:00

"And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.’"

~ Kurt Vonnegut
A Man Without a Country

flowers may

2011-05-27T20:20:00.017-04:00

Street vendor caisson
Secret of life in full bloom
Flowering wind chimes

photo by the Seeberger Brothers - Jules (1872-1932) Louis (1874-1946) and Henri (1876-1956) And, as always, all 17 syllables picked for 'recuerda mi corazon', exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

night gallery

2011-05-23T23:40:00.004-04:00

You.
You there.
To the left. Here.

Yes. Wait. No sense summoning the museum director. I will have turned my back once more before you return.

I am speaking to you. The fork was midway to my mouth when I felt you. But you already knew that. Who in their right mind paints a man shoveling slop to his pie hole? Ah, it's my claim for all eternity. My manners! Let me introduce myself.

I am François, your faithful servant.

I felt the brush of your delicate finger upon my elbow. Perhaps you doubted the four hundred year-old paint was not dry? Ah, better, a smile, yes. Such fine teeth!
You were deep in thought, a true connoisseur like my father, and his father before him, looking for minute significance of the brush of an eccentric to canvas. Let me assist you.

Our guest, Maurice here, is fascinated by, well, I believe you twenty-first centurions call it a kaleidoscope. Maurice, an intellectual scholar unable to tunnel his way out of a hessian sack, terms it, 'oh, look at the fancy colored light!'

That's my beautiful and precious sister, Tessy, opposite. She weeps over me daily. I admit - I wasn't going to talk to you but she kicked me when she saw you first. A beautiful girl. And let me introduce you to my hopeless brother-in-law, Conrad, a village idiot tactless enough to bring a lute to the supper table. Wouldn't be so bad if he played in the key that Angels sing, but, lo, or hark, as we say, he plucks away in the vicinity of the key of G. Probably for gravy. A cold gravy waltz. I just thought of that. Pretty swift, heh? My poor sister. He plays the French Horn in bed. Idiot.

Yes. I suppose it is time. Back to my fork. So tiresome even though dessert has finally arrived. You, a true connoisseur. Move along now.

go

2011-05-20T21:24:00.017-04:00

You, going my way
Open sky, vagabond route
Two wandering hearts

Route 66 Seligman, Arizona 1947 by Andreas Feininger All 17 syllables dedicated to the wandering travelers at 'recuerda mi corazon,' exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

fine old relics

2011-05-17T08:01:00.001-04:00

If I lose my place
Entomb my soul in old books
Amongst beloved prose

mote stew

2011-05-13T23:54:00.000-04:00

Step up for dinner
shove in illegal riff-faff
dash of tobasco

All 17 syllables dished out for 'recuerda mi corazon', exclusive home of Haiku My Heart

the films of Terrence Malick

2011-05-13T18:51:00.006-04:00

Ah, this thing gives me the chills. Love it. Terrence Malick series at the Museum of the Moving Image in New York

two doves

2011-05-09T20:32:00.044-04:00

It was out grazing peacefully in the rolling meadow beyond a hurried silent brook, down by the skeletal timbers of an old church with a solid bell tower and wild wheat-colored pampas grass shooting in bunches out of the crumbled stone walkway.

Lowering the binoculars to his chest, he raised the sight and sweatily squeezed one off, dropping the black beast. There wasn't a soul around to celebrate. It deserved a New Orleans-style funeral procession with plenty of cowbell, raspberrian tubas, and golden horns. Or a ticker tape parade. Ding Dong the beast was dead. He waved to the crowds lining the sidewalks that were no wheres to be seen. Not even a rolled-down proclamation read by the pasty Mayor of Munchkinland.

After awhile he felt empty, mighty lonesome. Then guilt was seeping in. He wept quietly. He murdered a hungry animal that was only guilty of being attracted to a Twinkie that a rather large lady was preparing to devour at a picnic table. Even in the throws of death the black beast was still showing angry teeth and when he moved in for a closer look-see, its open eyes startled him so he back peddled over an old rusty cast iron hand pump, tripped and accidentally squeezed another shot off. The bullet ricocheted off the bell waking two nesting pure white doves lazily brushing their outstretched wings against the hundred-year-old ancient bell, navigating into the blue with the precision of a sextant eastward in the direction of Assisi.
And they went together.

alignment

2011-05-06T23:37:00.011-04:00

Smile of blue heaven
reunion of lustrous mates
oh go on, say cheese

Crescent Moon and Venus, with Mars to Venus' upper left, and Saturn right. courtesy Jimmy Westlake All 17 syllables dedicated to the stars at 'recuerda mi corazon', exclusive home of Haiku My Heart.

1933

2011-05-04T20:54:00.011-04:00

shoeless shunned orphan
milk and honey hobo dreams
nineteen thirty three

~Smoldering Fires Clarence Holbrook Carter, 1941

stars fell on Alabama

2011-04-29T21:56:00.000-04:00

Healing melody
here's to better days ahead
Alabama blues

All 17 syllables dedicated to the fine company at 'recuerda mi corazon', exclusive home of Haiku My Heart.

H Lee on her birthday

2011-04-28T20:52:00.004-04:00

Maycomb was an old town, but it was a tired old town when I first knew it. In rainy weather the streets turned to red slop; grass grew on the sidewalks, the courthouse sagged in the square. Somehow, it was hotter then: a black dog suffered on a summer's day; bony mules hitched to Hoover carts flicked flies in the sweltering shade of the live oaks on the square. Men's stiff collars wilted by nine in the morning. Ladies bathed before noon, after their three-o'clock naps, and by nightfall were like soft teacakes with frostings of sweat and sweet talcum.

To Kill A Mockingbird ~ Harper Lee

white noise

2011-04-25T19:47:00.030-04:00

He was dead less than a minute, confirmed by Dr. Higgenbottom, it was in all the papers, and his reawakening has spilled over into a bubbling wellspring of books, one crackpot heralded thesis titled Death On His Lunch Break, Holmesian monograms scribbled on brittle yellow paper, bearded white-coat lectures in grand marble halls throughout Europe, an unfinished clay bust sculpted by a permanently deceased arthritic octogenarian, late afternoon talk shows culminating in finger pointing, chair throwing and stitches, repeated requests for interviews, all predicated in the salient fact of what he witnessed:
He saw a white light.
He'd given his statement. It was just the one sentence.
'It was like I was hovering and was blinded by a white light and that's all I can tell you.'
That's it.

He's to arrive within the hour. The scorched silver pot of coffee has just started to perk. We both cherish coffee. That was my bait. A clear glass vase of fresh yellow and violet flowers should be the first thing he sees upon entering. Two steps into the hallway he will have an unobstructed view of the firm oranges and red delicious apples in the miniature picnic basket on the scarlet-clothed kitchen table. Gave 75 cents for that quaint rufous basket from a somber, pale woman at a yard sale. I don't know if she was ever dead. I was strangely attracted to her. Wheat hair in wisps of gray, unwinking eyes. As though maybe she was my wife before we both died. It was her idea to make it a fruit basket. Was thinking of adding grapes for full prism effect. Don't know what I'll ask him beyond cream and sugar.

this island earth

2011-04-22T23:58:00.023-04:00

Reading of the will
earthly gold inheritance
all left to the meek
photograph by Mike Disfarmer(1884-1959) As always, all 17 syllables dedicated to 'recuerda mi corazon', exclusive home of Haiku My Heart.

the vagabond

2011-04-19T21:30:00.039-04:00

He pushed away the bowl of wet cement flakes drowning in milk with a circus fly on the porcelain rim ready to high dive. He complained to Olive and she shook her head in disbelief. They watched the fly flutter to the white ceiling. He saw the brown specks.
"What would you like instead?"
"Eggs. And toast." The rain pelted the diner window louder. They both looked towards the window. A vagabond in a floppy hat with rain rolling off it like a busted downspout was leaning to one side staring in, amazed at all that chrome. Counter edge, chair spindles, serving ledge with one order up between kitchen and cash register, Olive's name tag holder, shiny towering coffee urn. "And coffee."
"Black?" she asked sadly.
"Black," he replied, watching the man with water rolling off his brim. "You think he's hungry?"
"Yes."
He looked at Olive. He looked at the man and motioned. "I'll eat at that table over yonder. Bring the same. Same to same. And another fork."
The hat carefully placed on the peg was dripping on the black and white checkered floor even though the man wrung it like a washcloth and Olive shook it like a cocker spaniel after a bath. The man thanked her kindly.
He had four eggs, six slices of crunchless toast, two refills of coffee, black, and not once did he look up from the plate. He was in the habit of watching any food carefully. Olive, leaning on the back counter near the hot urn warming her slim pale hands, watched the benefactor, finishing breakfast long ago, unable to make out one-word conversation and vagabond nods, thoughtfully following the swirling rise from his cigarette, imagining it smoking down a high diving circus fly.

Let's Play

2011-04-15T19:30:00.028-04:00

sleek buoyant triplets
comfort wayward mariners
gentle sacred hearts

Let's Play was created by artist Eric VanRaemdonck, a dear and talented man. Eric passed away last Monday after a mighty battle against leukemia. He was always generous and encouraging when commenting on stories I wrote. R.I.P. Eric. One more brilliant star now makes its eternal home in the night sky.

out of mind

2011-04-11T22:28:00.004-04:00

He was dead before she heard the thump on the floor. That's my guess. No ID. Only thing in his pockets is this slip of paper with...here it is...get this, Charlie...'avoid Spinoza at all costs.' Looks like the ink pen exploded after that. The Grand Tour started three blocks away, not in a straight line of course, diving off the rim of a wine goblet spread eagle, somersaulting over a series of shot glasses after breaking a window out of the Simmons' place. Mrs. Simmons said he was red-eyed. Let's see. I wrote it down. Wait. Oh, here it is - no biggy. He called her Mrs. cinnamon. 'Twirled his hands when he said it.' Warm wine gestures. Actually demanded champagne iced in a wicker basket and complained her ice cube trays were empty in the freezer. Quite attractive woman. Beautiful elfin eyes. Walnut-brown hair. Told her he wanted chignon champagne whatever that is. Then he waltzed in the unlocked back door here, two in the morning out of the chill of the night, and went in search of slamming cupboard doors to hook up with a cooking sherry IV. Muddy footprints right out of a cheap detective dime novel on the counter where he tried to curl up like handcuffed Houdini in the cupboard with the bottle I guess.

Stumbling into the other room looking for a night cap I figure that trembling parrot up on the ceiling fan startled him more than he scared it. Down boy! That's not the way you call birds? Maybe tongue clicking will drop it. I guess it'll come down eventually. Maybe it's a chignon bird. No? Well, it sure the hell ain't a magpie. Anyway she heard the thud as she descended the stairs wearing nothing but a white robe, her hair bobbing in the back. I wish I could remember what they call that bobbing hair girls wear. Look under the sheet. What a wicked smile, eyes wide open, ready for his closeup. Must've been amused at that final blurred vision of ruffling blue and orange feathers as he slipped on a banana peel into the unknown. Get him the hell out of here.

violet lament

2011-04-08T19:01:00.006-04:00

Soft light, sharp focus
shadowed heart exit stage right
quiet on the set

As always, all 17 syllables thrown against the wall for 'recuerda mi corazon', exclusive home of haiku my heart.

opticals

2011-04-04T22:20:00.000-04:00

'200 million green backs to go in search of little green men.'
'Well, I guess it proves there's water on Mars.'
'I believe its fake.'
'You know, it kinda looks like a golf ball.'
'Naw.'
'A golf ball shot out of a cannon.'
'Out of a what?'
'A golf ball shot out of a cannon splintering a 37 year old heartwood ricocheting off the side of a one-horse barn that needs painting through a cow's underpass speeding past a Scottish knoll slow rolling and nudged into the cup of a four-par hole by a misfit magpie scrounging for morsels.'
'Bogey.'