The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
MrSmith1's picture

A Rainbow-Filled Friday Afternoon at the Haikulodeon

 


 

Here's this week's heap of haikus:

 

tanka haiku:

Crowded Conveyance;
Two women, a dog, a bike,
a small child and me.

   Crammed in an elevator
   Waiting for the thing to go.

 


---

 


In the small pocket
of my denim jeans is a
button from your coat.

 

 

---


 

 

Coca cola signs
seemed to be ev'rywhere once,
Thirst for nostalgia.

 

 

...

 

 


In a fitful sleep,
memories long forgotten,
rise to consciousness.

 

 


---

 

 


Flying through the air,
should be avoided by both,
dentures and toupees.

 

 

 

---

 

 

tanka haiku:

News headline: Science
proves that you can live forever!
Film at eleven.

   (My first thought, of course, was that
   Social Security's f*cked!)


 

---

 

I'm chained to a desk
staring at computer screens
where did my life go?

 


---

 


I know that I have
'Scalia Schadenfreude';
his rage makes me smile.


 

---

 

 


If you force yourself
to go outside, something great
will always happen ...

So says Mary, age 93 - (More or Less)

 

---

 

 

 

The long arc of the
moral universe always
bends towards true justice.

A Martin Luther King, Jr. quote (more or less)


---

 


A quartet of haikus:

 

After all these years,
I still haunt the lost and found,
looking for my life.

I still ride the train,
in hope the next station will
be where I get off.

I cross bridges knowing
I can not wash away all
the sins of my life.

I am stuck in time
living out a meager life
extracting fool's gold.

 

 

---

 

 

 

I may still be lost,
but I am not alone and
that is a comfort.

 

 

---

 

 

We must leave the day ...
We must rest to prepare for
the struggles to come.

 


---
 

 

 

I hear distant trains
and think of riding boxcars ...
whistles on the wind.

 

 

 


---

 

 

double haiku:

 

It's three fifteen, and
wakened from a sad dream, I
try to clear my head.

Thoughts of you linger
and entwine with my day's chores.
You still haunt my heart.

 
---

 


Under rainbow flags
Misters and Sisters confirm
their loves at long last.

 


---

 

 


On grey, rainy days,
she first sulked at the window,
then, wished for blue skies.

 

 


---

 

 


They sway with the breeze,
which is why her little dog,
barks at sunflowers.

 


---

 

 


Idyllic dream-scapes;
lush, green mountains still surround
the Hudson River
.

(Painting by John Frederick Kensett (American, 1816–1872) | Hudson River Scene )

 

---

 

Set wide the window
and let me drink in the day
for I'm feeling parched.

(from an Edith Wharton quote ... more or less.)  

 
---

 


Sunshine and whiskey
are a lot like Love; they all
can make you go blind.

 


---

 

 


I feel so alone.
I watch the tide come in and
think of yesterday.

 

 

 

---


 

 

Bells in the distance ...
Yipee!  It's the ice cream man!
Wanna creamsicle?

 

 

---

 

 


A couple cuddles
outside of the Guggenheim,
then hails a taxi.

 


---

 

 

Summer afternoons,
lazy sunshine, as I stroll.
Dirt road daydreaming.

 

 
---

 

 


Colored beach balls float
on incoming waves. Children
squeal and splash about.

 

 

---

 

 

With a painter's eyes,
and a poet's soul, he found
beauty ev'rywhere.
 

 

 

---

 

 


They were on a lark,
when they met an old school mate
living on the street.

 

 
 
---

 

 

The quick red fox jumped
o'er lazy typewriters, owned
by sleeping brown dogs.

 

 


---

 

 


Plaid lumberjack shirt
o'er black tights and blue tattoos;
hot babe on 4th St.

 

 

---

 

 

I stand in a field,
listening to the night's sounds ...
strangely comforted.

 

 

---

 
 

A whisper, a glance ...
her touch lasts but a moment,
yet his core's shaken.


 

---

 


Memories still pop
into my addled brain, to
amuse my dull thoughts.

 


---

 

 

tanka haiku:

Graceful extensions,
limber elevations, and
lithe, flowing movements.

   Beauty and Ballet combined
   will feed hung’ry hope-starved souls.

 

 

---

 

 

As the swallows swoop,
The roses dance in the breeze;
the world in motion.


Utagawa Hiroshige (Japanese, 1797–1858) |
Swallows and Kingfisher with Rose Mallows | ca. 1838

 

 

 

 

---

 

 

 

How the sky has cleared
after such a drenching rain.
The sun reassures.

 

(Photo courtesy of my friend and neighbor, David Thompson,  who took this looking out his window yesterday.)

****

 

 

 

Comments

That's all right

Give me back my button

My life just went down the tank

It could have been MUCH

(better if I had had that damn button)

I do not really

know about the lost and found

Salvation Army

(is for me)

hahahahaha

I cannot count to well today

WELL DONE MR. SMITH!

 


Thanks, DD!! 

 

I forgot to add this one to the original posting ...

 

 

I advocate but
I do not insist.  All hearts
will change when ready.

The flag that I plant
is but a marker, that says,
seeds were buried here.

 

 

 ---

 

 


Here!

 

Plastic & fabric buttons showing holes & shank.jpg
"Plastic & fabric buttons showing holes & shank" by Richard Wheeler (Zephyris) 2007. ==Licensing==. Original uploader was Tyranny Sue at en.wikipedia - Transferred from en.wikipedia; transferred to Commons by User:Balajijagadesh using CommonsHelper. (Original text : File:Buttons 2.jpg). Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

 

 


Ha!  Thanks, trking!   I don't know why, but that little haiku about the button is one of my new favorites.  It is so simple and unadorned, it is not clever or witty nor has any rhyme to recommend it.  It is just a statement, and yet, I think it gets to the essence of something and creates a vivid image.   Sometimes I surprise myself with the haikus that pop into my head.  This was one that just sprang into my head on Thursday night.  Serendipity.

 


 


It was a rainbow filled night too at the Whitehouse.  (no audio)


I laugh to think of Nixon inviting Anita Bryant to the White House and then the grounds-keeper turning on this light show. 
 



San Francisco City Hall tonight.

 

largest

 


Last weekend San Fransico Court House put on this light show for it's 100 anniversary. 

 

for I'm feeling parched

after a labor of hunger

hacking and hewing


cannot convince me

to go outside, something great

and fearsome awaits


barks at sunflowers,

argues with dandelions,

such is sweet grandpa


Excellent Trope!   I like this one about Grandpa the best!
 


Thanks. I like it best, too. I can just see grandpa on all fours arguing with the dandelions. :)


With tiny fingers,

extreme focus, steady nerves,

he buttoned a fly.


HA!   Good one, Oxy!!

He buttoned a fly,
which, he thought, more manly than
zippering a moth.

 

 


With tiny fingers,

long lost memories scratching

our itch to forget.


Good one, Missy!

 

Procreation blues:
Long lost memories scratching
our id's bids for kids.


 


Our id's bids for kids

like the sleds on which we slid

tend to flip our lids.


the memories slide

like the sleds on which we slid

faster and faster


Nice, Trope!
 


HA!  You would pick that line ... LOL   Well done, Missy!

Stored in the garage,
like the sleds on which we slid,
broken toys we hid.

 


With tiny fingers,

the young child touches the bark

of the ancient tree


Nice.

With tiny fingers,
reaching for ten tiny toes,
she learned her 'piggies.'


repeating signal,
like a fog horn heard at sea,
tells me where I am.

Circle of bright fire
that cannot be held with hands
looks for knowing eyes.


Good, moat!!

Like a fog horn's drone,
my GPS annoys while
giving directions

 

---

 

 


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