i think of
you in my arms . . .
dreaming spring

Where are you today, the flutter of wings sailing somewhere, the river carving sandstone walls into miniature amusements parks, a meeting with God, dawn's early light, the smile of stained glass superstars waiting to go on stage . . . the five senses dancing around may poles in a canvas tent used for revival meetings and campfire ghosts, the calliopi's song, an anthem God hid from you until now i lay you down to sleep, heal this ageless sage, fill her mind with starlit rage, show her to the stage singing psalms people pay no attention to, like the zoka, irrelevant, outdated, substituted for caramel corn and whisk brooms bought monthly with tithes wrapped in loin cloths, underage children sew 16 hours a day in the back streets of India between photos, and you, staring at a white portal we don't want you to enter.

A Haibun for Svetlana Marisova
The Alley Cats


alley cats . . .
raking leaves with our
friend, the wind

Just yesterday you poked me on Facebook, unable, due to cancer, to write a poem, a note, knowing a simple poke would suffice. We are family: you,Ted, Sasa, and now, Hansha: Alley cats of the Anglo-English language Japanese short form poetry world, you call us. And I guess we are, judging by the reactions to what we stand for regarding aesthetics and poetry penned by members of the haiku "in-club" who've done it their way in half-filled auditoriums for too many years, heralding haiku as the great IS and isn't, that special moment when everything clicks together into a Kenneth Yasuda epiphany with a wineglass full of pop zen, Ogden Nash, Japhy fucking Japhy Ryder, a teaspoon of Imagism, a tablespoon of Kerouac, and a generous jigger of Blythe who knew nothing about hermeneutics and the Yamoto language but had the balls to translate volumes of Basho, Buson, and other pre-Mejian era haiku masters, not knowing his head from his ass regarding the Yamoto language, let alone the religions that influenced these great poets. 

Listening to the mean spirited criticisms online of people who disagree with us with their off-beat misconceptualizations of haiku reminds me of Heckle and Jeckle on steroids. They fight with themselves, unable to agree on what is and isn't a haiku. If Basho were alive and trashed their reasoning online for creating haiku that looks and reads like anything but, they's collectively call him an old fart who was out of date with the times. Remind you of the "in crowd" in high school who dictated what was cool to say and wear?

as egrets,
jackle, we shape shifted
into words

And when you spoke, no one waxed mean to you, as you had this magic with speech that didn't enrage people. If I wrote: "Amen!"  to what you said, shades of Batman and Robin, the faux lords and lordettes of the royal society of half ass haiku-like poetry, would change their tune until you'd tell them to cool it. You were and still are an enigma to me as no one was more private than you. You have this well-read photographic mind that has no end. I remember you telling me you were an older woman in a young woman's body who was private because too many had been mean to you in the past. Well, Svetlana, I can relate to that. Poets from any genre are mostly egotistical and/or fixated with the herd instinct. Many Anglo-Americans grew up with a hatred of the Japanese, and watched television shows that called anything cheap, "Made in Japan."  America still is a bastion of prejudice for white.  WHITE's become the acceptable color. Why do you think people in Asian and Spanish cultures whiten their skin and idolize white-skinned stars and celebrities?

Zoka, we
too, wait for you
to paint our
souls the darkness
of a canyon wall


Well, you're with the Lord Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary now, where no one's influenced by the crapolla theologians downstairs preach and start wars with. Those clerics are like the good old boys and girls of the pseudo haiku world who can't agree on almost anything. Little they say and teach is verified by scholars with a good hermeneutical understanding of the Yamato language or see a need for Kigo having been colonized by the Anglo-Western German-based university system, which explains why haiku written in the Anglo-Western world varies little from that written by Japanese haiku poets.

fly with wings
through Dali-esque
rainbows . . .
painted without numbers
and a cheap brush


I miss your haiku, even if you did see me as a mentor and scholar. Hell, girl, you taught me one hell of a lot. You were and still are my spiritual mentor.
You, myself, Sasa, Ted, and Hansha are quite a team. Will always be. We love haiku, see it as the embodiment of Zoka, and we all, if together at the Wonderland Amusement Park would get on the back of a 1500 pound frog and make the big plop into the still mill pond few have trouble understanding with their Anglo-Western anal retentive mindset, and sing psalms and ditties like the crazy alley cats we are, long after midnight, and drink woo woo juice, laugh our fool heads off, and throw a cat into a mass of pigeons, to stir the pot.

that frog!
a dream painted with
pond water?


No goodbyes, Svetlana, you still live and are family to us, even if you are invisible and teaching the teachable, non-egotistical Saint Peter how to write real haiku and play a mean game of chess. Talk to you soon, Beetle!

the stained glass
wings of an eagle . . .
men can't shape