Thursday, 30 January 2025

Five Poems & Three Haiku by Wayne F. Burke

 






Crows

winging their way through
bright white, blue, grey, sky, as
some kind of beautiful dream
goes on in the stratosphere.
Meanwhile, down here
in Livermore--houses anchored to 
immovable shore--a breeze moves
leaves (Kelly-green all summer);
their white palms upheld for alms from
the Great Giver 
93 mills distant.


Doe Ray Me

rays of cell phones
elect-tron-ic devices
create neuroblastomas; so
too irradiated food of
mega-farm factories and
heartless slaughterhouse prisons
of animal torture; bring bad
karma, accidents and
non-natural disasters, plus
more hungry ghosts polluting
the world--gluttinous glutinous
maximus gnawing at roots
of trees toppled and burnt
for fuel to feed 
big-mouth gobblers 
of samsara world...


Fire-y sunrise--fuego! 6:30 a.m.
A really big shew by the sun before
it hides, that coward, behind clouds, and
is swamped, like a dying ember.
In November. Remember? In the rain.


ku

sky let loose in a pourrential downfall

poplar trees say YES! YESSssss! in the wind.

It is the fate of shore rocks to be rounded.

"Stolid" is "solid" but the "t" makes solider.


Haiku

Sunday moaning--
chime to go to
mass again



Ocean says
SCHussss!
Liss shen...



The Lady of Amherst
said to tell it "slant"
but I think "bent"
the betterer
way.


Again

the birds are chirping and
why shouldn't they?
The sun is out and
it is a mild 70-degrees:
a perfect day
in every way
that will keep getting better
until 3 p.m., when
I have to go to work
again.


Transporter

I am sent to the 7th floor to transfer a woman from the burn unit to dermatology. I show up at the designated time and room, with a wheelchair. The woman to be transferred sits on the side of her bed, hands clasped in the lap of her robe. Her face looks like a cooked pepperoni pizza. She is a human being but resembles a thing. Like a stalk of some kind in a robe. After the first glance, I cannot look at her again. Cannot. She speaks and I answer; she speaks some more: I look directly into her eyes which are clear, pupils light-blue in colour. My response is no longer choked. I can speak easily to her--so long as I stay within the eyes. We have a good chat; she tells me about the fire. In a trailer. No way out for her...She's a nice woman--just burnt.



Wayne F. Burke's poetry has been widely published in print and online (including in LOTHLORIEN POETRY JOURNAL). He is author of 8 published full-length collections of poetry, one short story collection, and two nonfiction works (most recently BUKOWSKI the Ubermensch, Cyberwit.net., 2023). He lives in Vermont (USA).

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