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juvenile haiku


by strannikov


a late season's leaves

float into a brook among

bubbles fit to burst.

 

infancy alone,

terminal infancy, will

get us in the end.

 

grasping not at straws

but at stars—reachable stars,

the ones you can hold.

 

heaving and howling,

skies blast black depth-ripping screams,

booms drop dark from night.

 

anvils fall to earth

thrown from black skies—pounding thuds,

clanging clatters dull.

 

lightning flashes white

silver forked branches or roots

crack crash vanish black.

 

appetitive plate,

find your hunger from some pan,

your nutritive need.

 

snarling screaming rage—

just when we don't have enough,

Brussels sprouts are served.

 

childhood: enjoy it

while it lasts—adolescence

begins in one year!

 

as our sun drips blood

white skies race through navy clouds,

stars stare down, perplexed.

 

dreamy and piercing,

my mother's eyes outlive her

early departure.


my father, farmer,

planted near his father, whose

farm holds his father.

 

time's expendable

generations breed, our earth

keeps all to herself.

 

who escapes this earth?

we're all captives of our moon,

whose hushed watch charms us.

 

don't despair, our dead,

we'll sleep with you soon, for our

earth is but one grave.

 

worms squirm into dust

dust the space for slithering

worms and corkscrewed dust.

 

our dust stirs itself

with other dust, as needed:

we are that dust, we.

 

 

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