HAIKU for the SEASONS
Feathery forest
Frost ices stripped tree branches
Wind-frozen winter
Birds with cozy nests
Close-around-them softly lined
Small homes just enough
Lazy days’ hot sun
Floppy hats and sunglasses
Bring me a cold drink
Red, brown, and yellow
An autumn leaf tumbles down
Drifting on a breath
Feathery forest
Frost ices stripped tree branches
Wind-frozen winter
Birds with cozy nests
Close-around-them softly lined
Small homes just enough
Lazy days’ hot sun
Floppy hats and sunglasses
Bring me a cold drink
Red, brown, and yellow
An autumn leaf tumbles down
Drifting on a breath
Interlude
“It’s green, just green,” she states tersely
impatient with desire to move on
to something else besides sitting
but I simply smile, ignoring her
reclining in near silence on our old camp blanket
finishing up the last crumbs of a late spring picnic
next to the jade green river bubbletrickling
miniature whitecaps ruffling and bumping
over uneven but smoothed rocks slick with algae
olive green and stringy, clinging like wet hair
as sunlight sparkles off the bottle green waves
dappling the meadow around us and birds hopflit
from one patch of shadow to another
winging up to basketweave branches
topping tree trunks greening with brown-edged moss
velvety bumps trailing from fairy beds hidden
in tufts of wild grasses, limegreen fading to pale
sprouting rakishly around tree trunks
through cracks in rock canyon walls rough with graygreen lichen
spreading like fingers of a gnarled old man
reaching for the crinkled blossoms clustered on
thin branches laced with flat kelly green leaves and
silver strands of a spider’s web shimmering against
dark green stalks and black thorns of a wild rose bush.
I break off a tightly formed bud hiding furled petals,
carefully place it in her hair and kiss her cheek
“It’s green, just green,” she states tersely
impatient with desire to move on
to something else besides sitting
but I simply smile, ignoring her
reclining in near silence on our old camp blanket
finishing up the last crumbs of a late spring picnic
next to the jade green river bubbletrickling
miniature whitecaps ruffling and bumping
over uneven but smoothed rocks slick with algae
olive green and stringy, clinging like wet hair
as sunlight sparkles off the bottle green waves
dappling the meadow around us and birds hopflit
from one patch of shadow to another
winging up to basketweave branches
topping tree trunks greening with brown-edged moss
velvety bumps trailing from fairy beds hidden
in tufts of wild grasses, limegreen fading to pale
sprouting rakishly around tree trunks
through cracks in rock canyon walls rough with graygreen lichen
spreading like fingers of a gnarled old man
reaching for the crinkled blossoms clustered on
thin branches laced with flat kelly green leaves and
silver strands of a spider’s web shimmering against
dark green stalks and black thorns of a wild rose bush.
I break off a tightly formed bud hiding furled petals,
carefully place it in her hair and kiss her cheek