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Wade’s 101: Haiku retrospective 43

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  1. garden buffet
    The leaves have little
    bite marks where wild visitors
    stop for healthy snacks.
  2. a trip to the beach
    Find the perfect spot
    for catching rays, reading trash,
    making sand castles.
  3. kiss track
    When artists feud, let
    them make up with lip-locks set
    to a funky beat.
  4. canning fodder
    The fight for freedom
    never ends. Must we always
    send them in harm’s way?
  5. eternal summer
    Rising seas, flooded
    coasts, ancient viruses, wide-
    spread decimation.
  6. stirrings
    A gentle breeze lifts
    my aching heart to new heights.
    Love is in the air.
  7. frustration without representation
    No one else was in
    the room where it happened, the
    room where it happened.
  8. a mom’s poetry journal
    First words, first steps, first
    day of school. Write it all down,
    even when it hurts.
  9. a sorta fairytale 2.0
    Once upon a time.
    Boy swipes girl. Boy loses girl.
    Boy friends girl. The end.
  10. logged out
    They dismantled the
    giant oak, its wooden bones
    left out on the curb.
  11. the path once taken
    Ugly gardens, mean
    mutts, a falling piano
    and a touch of puke.
  12. we take it for granted
    The long forgetting
    of little niceties done
    without need of praise.
  13. alternative fiction
    The edges of the
    reality distortion
    field grow unbounded.
  14. the patriarch, the baby and the father
    The specter of death
    came calling and never left
    our once happy home.
  15. james and the giant (im)peach
    The corridors of
    power echo with the words
    of the lone top cop.
  16. restless heart syndrome
    Insecurity,
    a faithful companion to
    keep me uneasy.
  17. as goes flint
    Water comes in both
    leaded, unleaded. Make sure
    yours is the right one.
  18. cardiac conditioning
    Love, however brief,
    strengthens a heart against the
    loss that often comes.
  19. keys to resiliency
    Be realistic.
    Believe life is meaningful.
    Wing it when needed.
  20. a time of renewal
    Withered vines and dead
    leaves cleared for a row of new
    seeds and some sunshine.
  21. the monster at the end of this preview
    All movie trailers
    end the same way: with shameless
    pleas to buy tickets.
  22. curse of the attentive
    Staring at the back
    of everyone else’s phones,
    waiting to converse.
  23. what i call my junk
    The exclamation
    point delivers excitement
    in a slim package.
  24. you do you
    Her tirades against
    the universe came from her
    weird Twitter outbursts.
  25. all sweat, all the time
    After a shower,
    waking up, getting something
    from the car, breathing.
  26. then ludicrous plan it is
    A reasonable
    course of action is seldom
    called upon to try.
  27. vox unpopuli
    The most persuasive
    voice is the one nagging deep
    from inside the head.
  28. the wake of cindy
    Rain nourished the land
    in a reassuring caress
    on a darkened day.
  29. woes before doze
    Night becomes prison
    for insomniacs who want
    parole to dreamland.
  30. a greedy cancer
    Corruption poisons
    the powerful, infecting
    people with mistrust.
  31. rip megan rondini
    She was raped. She cried
    for help. They shunned her, blamed her.
    Then she killed herself.
  32. sitcom scrum
    The idiot ball
    bounces from character to
    character for laughs.
  33. bles this mess
    It’s easy to write
    haiku when you don’t have to
    count out the sylla—
  34. post-lunch lull
    The afternoon is
    for wrapping napkins, flirting
    with fellow servers.
  35. creative input
    Knowing trivia
    answers: good. Making up the
    answers: much better.
  36. the finicky gourmand
    She would eat only
    chicken fingers, potatoes
    (mashed) and M&Ms.
  37. every day’s a vacation in the ocean
    Even the sharks are
    headed to the beach for some
    swimming and nibbling.
  38. salt water tally
    Waves write their names in
    lattice letters of foam with
    disappearing ink.
  39. certain unalienable rights
    That among these are
    Life, Liberty and the pur-
    suit of Happiness.
  40. declare and conquer
    The Founding Fathers
    understood all too well the
    power-mad tyrant.
  41. the zen of baking
    The pan holds batter.
    The oven radiates. The
    cake rises or falls.
  42. two out of three on the grateful list
    Being in great health.
    Having great abdominals.
    Great at telling lies.
  43. grateful on the go
    Discount muffins and
    cheap gas and a car that lasts
    for some 20 years.
  44. grateful on the net
    The fellowship, the
    friendship and the endless wealth
    of cute videos.
  45. body positivity gratitude
    Grateful for teeth that
    chew (but not great at tearing),
    soft lips and soft hands.
  46. are you not grateful to be entertained?
    Peak television.
    Audiobooks on demand.
    Superhero flicks.
  47. a grateful spirit embiggens the smallest soul
    Grateful for things that
    last, relationships that grow,
    a heart that accepts.
  48. on the road to gratitude
    Hospitality
    in strange places, a kind heart,
    inviting cuisine.
  49. the good place
    The friend zone is where
    I want to be, gossiping
    laughing and scheming.
  50. the blogging fairy
    The blogging fairy
    brings good ideas and lots
    of site visitors.
  51. an introvert in hell
    Just need that one lone
    hour away from people
    and charts and mingling.
  52. finite jest
    Considering how
    stupid life is, it’s better
    that we are mortal.
  53. winky face heart eyes
    The journey of a
    thousand texts begins with a
    single emoji.
  54. the mask of zero
    Sometimes, character
    is revealed under the most
    mundane conditions.
  55. flash film binge
    They watched a bunch of
    nobodies bring everything
    to life in 2 days.
  56. a soul so light
    Unburdened with lies
    and mistakes, grasping for love
    and understanding.
  57. battle of the networker stars
    He passed out business
    cards like candy, the kind that
    rots your will to live.
  58. heads, we’re good
    The choice to be nice.
    The choice to be kind. The choice
    to be fair. Take it.
  59. perhaps a second intermission
    The tenor declares
    mild weather in a 20-
    minute aria.
  60. kids’ matinee
    They marched into the
    theater single file and
    watched without a peep.
  61. home remedies
    Take a bee’s stinger,
    mix it with ointment and brine,
    inject rectally.
  62. a minor legal matter
    A Boy Scout is blah,
    blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
    blah, blah, blah and blah.
  63. after employee chip insertion
    Make them dance like the
    puppets they are, then charge them
    double for vending.
  64. a type of food group
    His idea of
    cooking was to open a
    bag of chips, served fresh.
  65. at the reunion of former classmates
    Everyone’s bigger,
    balder, gauntier, louder
    and mostly sadder.
  66. imposters
    They share our first and
    last names, but their faces and
    minds are different.
  67. it’s been a privilege
    We do the same things
    but get different outcomes. It’s
    like the system’s rigged.
  68. not quite hitchcockian
    The audience seemed
    dazed once the lights came up and
    the credits rolled by.
  69. party hats optional
    She spent her birthday
    under the knife and fed by
    an array of tubes.
  70. high praise from the orchestra
    The brass bumped fists, the
    strings tapped bows, and the woodwinds
    trilled for no reason.
  71. guess who’s coming to instagram?
    The pork was simply
    photogenic, while the beets
    blushed under the lights.
  72. a mind left to its own devices
    Boredom should be a
    crime when imagination
    can sustain us all
  73. surrounded by greatness
    He was last in the
    batting order and worked to
    play better with less.
  74. the invisible woman
    No eyes were on her.
    No greetings to welcome her.
    A soul in shadows.
  75. flash flood flash
    A harmless creek swells
    into a tsunami of
    tumbling cars set free.
  76. just another day during world war 3
    Leaders trade barbs while
    missiles strike their objectives.
    Let’s watch it all die.
  77. a slight tenor
    His voice was his meal
    ticket, one that fed him with
    ramen and bean soup.
  78. a cooked book
    The recipe called
    for 2 cups of plot and a
    dash of character.
  79. love the brazilian way
    A sultry fling with
    heat, passion and some sandy
    settings at sunset.
  80. the sold-out talent show
    Little performers
    rehearsed their modest acts to
    torture their parents.
  81. educators when time permits
    Teachers are half moms,
    half counselors, half wardens
    and all underpaid.
  82. fighting the nazis
    Yell at them. Insult
    them. Spit on them. Drive them off.
    Punch them in the nose.
  83. but what about
    Stop defending the
    evil forces. Start taking
    care of each other.
  84. expressway to far away
    The highway will be
    rebuilt, but without all those
    cumbersome exits.
  85. floral camouflage
    Snapdragons lined the
    forest floor, giving cover
    to the wee creatures.
  86. newton’s lol
    Quietly the kids
    texted absurd nicknames for
    the science teacher.
  87. molecular attraction
    Oxygen had a
    three-way with some hydrogen
    and made a big splash.
  88. letters in a time of unrest
    He sent handwritten
    missives to his beloved
    while fighting back tears.
  89. reflect to deflect
    A chunk of rock casts
    a mighty shadow with help
    from a nearby star.
  90. the knight at the end of this book
    Each new page brought her
    closer to the past, finding
    love in the castle.
  91. conversational flow
    I like how she pelts
    me with questions, plus answers
    all the ones I ask.
  92. accounting migraine
    Cash flow barely a
    trickle, struggling to make the
    figures keep in shape.
  93. harvey, wallbanger
    The hurricane tore
    through the gulf to pummel the
    coast and its neighbors.
  94. normalizing the new normal
    The new normal is
    not new nor normal. It is
    fascism renewed.
  95. a city underwater
    The rain would not stop.
    Streets, homes, cars flooded, buried.
    The rain would not stop.
  96. the innings that pass
    They paid almost no
    attention to the game while
    lost in tender gaze.
  97. 11 trillion gallons
    Noah looked at the
    flood, gasped and swam for safety
    away from Houston.
  98. nursing home rescue
    The residents are
    evacuated safely,
    but what of the cats?
  99. the home of the future today
    The kitchen doesn’t
    clean itself, nor the bathroom.
    The maid goes to work.
  100. will of the triumph
    Our sorrows consume
    our thoughts, but our blessings need
    guided remembrance.
  101. the signal
    Her lips said nothing
    but kiss me again and a-
    gain and again and …

• • •

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  1. Wade on Birmingham » #sundayread for September 3, 2017
    Sunday, September 3, 2017, 12:06 am
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