Feb. 28 am

Driftwood seals castle
crags beneath the bridge in peace,
no call to siren.


Feb. 28 pm

Anteloping in
rush boom down the mad green lea,
thrash kites from the sky.

actual, not metaphorical, knife selling

Feb. 27 am

You selling knives, swathed
in heat, we claimed our Chevy
Malibu July.
-for DM


Feb. 27 pm

Pride's opponent folds
us in grace. Over curry
we kneel unmannered.
-for Erika

Feb. 25 am

Soon I'll shed this red
carapace. A minor star
(Festiva), burned out.


Feb. 25 pm

Story lifts like mist,
a straitjacket unwefted.
Empty sky reclaims.

it was the Day of the Beast, but nothing malevolent happened

Dang, I was very prolific that June. I think there was a lot of construction, and my commute was taking even longer than it does now.

June 6, 2006

I hide the maps and
apples. My pale horse hums in
the garage, waking.


June 6, 2002

Star heart, moon aloft.
You crawled back inside my chest.
The end of sadness.
-for TI

my bowl of chili's in the house

The rain was very distracting on my commute yesterday--there was just so much to look at in the sky: the clouds, the breaks in the clouds, the walls of fog. Am I getting simple?

Feb. 21 am

Witchcrafted in half
I'm voodooed in the driver's
seat. Who guards the doll?


Feb. 21 pm

Sweet unsteamed kettle
shrieks ascoted manners and
puppets to heaven.


But the primary source of my distraction is the arrival of the ever-elusive gata. In honor of this all-too-rare event, one from the archives:

June 7, 2006

Pie-makers, weep not:
Bake trophies of peaches; feed
your judges honey.
-for the gata

slo weekend

Feb. 20 am

Amidst shook buildings
a spring now wells where the earth
dived low in heartbeat.


Feb. 20 pm

Marble sung to the
stillest feather. To hear her
I would petrify.

order

My archives are a hot mess. I need to get these organized.

May 31, 2006

Talk about your mom,
your God, your keen remedies.
Close my eyes, spine-tied.
-for MC


June 14, 2006

Uncork the tonics.
Spider swooning on her web.
Binds stilled arms in thread.
-for MC

tagged

Dubin tells me I've been "tagged." I'm not sure what this means; as far I can tell, it's some kind of blog pyramid scheme. While I'm figuring out what the hell I'm supposed to do to avoid 10,000 years of bad luck because I haven't forward a message about angels and kittens to 10 friends in 10 minutes, here is one from the archives.

June 6, 2006

Vines boomed up. Tiger
drowned roarless in the sea. Teeth
clacked. Vulture sang back.

road trips

Feb. 14 am

Pack with care. Leave room
for wine, crickets, appetites
cracking with new sap.


Feb. 14 pm

Fish-eyed, sidewinder
tanned, Handyman Fred drives that
van bright with sermons.
-for Handyman Fred

Feb. 13 am

Stars quick-cometized,
deconstellated. Sky ripped
cumulonimbus.


Feb. 13 pm

How animals know
sadness--soft skin folds that bear
their supplications.

every morning I drive by the world's dreamiest billboard

Feb. 12 am

Oakland dawn's twin sun.
Anderson Cooper's billboard
rises angelic.


Feb. 12 pm

Judges robes shrug off
verdicts. They are only cranes
of paper, nesting.

Feb. 11 pm

Eyes limned, bravado
anchored in--a purring kit
tied up to a brick.

Land's End

Feb. 11 am

What lousy mercies.
We feed our angry sharks from
Land's End, unshipwrecked.

Feb. 7 am

Christina laughs at
my car's horn. "But it works!" You
always know it's me.


Feb. 7 pm

Seraphim blink. My
eyes lift off like kites. The cows
wheelbarrow me home.


And because Dusty gets a rest on Friday, and because my beautiful godson told me on the phone yesterday, "I love you Aunt Lisa," one from the archives:

May 31, 2006

Reading palms, ouijas,
your mother and I, age ten,
sought you in ether.
-for Luca

plus ça change...

Feb. 5 am

From my tragic Green
Party ballot Nader leers.
So we meet again.


Feb. 5 pm

Tennessee eyelids
droop humidly in lilac--
cricketed doorways.
-for JK


And one more from the archives, since today I did things like sleep and generate compassionate thoughts toward my fellow man rather than drive to work and back:

June 7, 2006

Hide the camera, leave
the house at dawn. We'll bury
knives in the garden.
-for ST

asleep or otherwise in deep shit behind the wheel

Feb. 4 am
(actual gnarly motorcycle crash on Van Ness)

His downed bike lion-
claims the road. His glass halo-ed
limbs held in gray veldt.


Feb. 4 pm

Arm gripped, eyes point-fixed,
I drove fifty thousand miles!
Unclutch, rest now, lamb.

from the archives: life is very short and strange

Because of its mostly half-assed nature, you might get the impression that the haiku commute project is primarily a product of ennui, and you'd be right. But this hasn't always been the case.

It was right around the one year anniversary of the sudden death of G that I began the project. The skies along the 101 corridor through Marin and Sonoma that time of year were clear and vast. Her death was, again, very much on my mind, during the day and also in my dreams. Many of my first generation haiku were dedicated to someone. These are for her in memory.

June 1, 2006

Me with shattered wings
and you--his first Icarus--
a clipped jay, lifted.


June 14, 2006

Maple seed spins from
the sky. Sister, I fed him
salt the day you died.

hydroplaning

Jan. 31 pm

The car watersnaked,
wheels spinning. Unbound, lightened.
Six seconds, set free.