Ways of Moving

(C) R.L.K.

1.
A chilly grey December day:
All morning long, while the trees
Empty around us, we walk on,
While the wet wind swoops down
On the last songbirds, we walk on.

2.
After the downpour,
The moon, busy drifting among clouds,
Spares us a moment
To pour a little light
On the highway.

3.
Clouds parting, a glimpse
Of a few stars, train rolling
Slowly down the hill;
"Bless the path on which we go" --
The long haul's nearly over.

As It Is (Autumn)

(C) R.L.K.

And so the leaves fall
yet again, swirling
red, whirling gold in
the November wind.
And so a soft rain
dampens the grass -- who
knows why? Things happen,
this season happens
in its own good time.

New Haiku for an Old Season

(C) R.L.K.


Shuttered train station --
The cry of a whippoorwill
Travels through the fog.
....

A chilly morning --
Is that hatless old scarecrow
Laughing at the wind?
....

October stillness;
The rays of the setting sun
Bronze the willow leaves.

Tanka Style: This September

(C) R.L.K.

Clouds like white suds in
a liquid blue sky; a brisk
wind shaking the oaks
on the hillside. Summer is
gone now, and I am weary.

Learning

(C) R.L.K.

It’s like
this
sometimes--

the wind,
the falling
leaves,

one
thin
dime,

and the sun
setting
around the corner.

Improvisations on an Old Typewriter

(C) R.L.K.
....
DUNES

dusk:
surf washing against the shore;
wind-
piled
sands
....
HOPPER

light reflected    reflected light
and so much
space
to pass time in

so what’s
a picture worth
and what’s
another word for

alone?
....
FRONT PORCH

a long day
done --
now,
to just sit here
under the clouds
and nod
along with the willows
beside the pond

Fragments from an American Journal

(C) R.L.K.
_______

Tonight this slow old train
rolls on. I sit alone,
staring out the window
and thinking distant thoughts
while the moon drags itself
across a ragged sky.

_______

after rain
a crescent
moon seen through
wind-parted
branches; stars
too, bright as
innocence

_______

What the scene is now
outside my window:
young leaves, brightened by
the sun, flutter in
the wind, daffodils
abound, and an old
wooden bench awaits.

Pentastich (Another Syllabic)

(C) R.L.K.

To come to summer once more: beams
of amber sunlight slanting through
the windows in the morning, slow
afternoons, nights when cloud-shadows
float under a violet moon.

A Philosopher At Eventide

(C) R.L.K.

"The facts of the world are not the end of the matter." -- L. Wittgenstein

What's with
the willow,
weeping outside

the window this
weary night? We
who are woeful

understand, while the rain
falls, down upon
the ruins. While the rain

falls, we who are weary,
we who are woeful,
will go on.

Drifts to Catch

(C) R.L.K.

1.
In the empty park
maples wave their silhouettes
at the red sunset.

2.
Sunlight moving, inch
by inch, and a single cloud
climbing on the wind.

3.
This clear April night
there's a moon in the sky and
a moon in the lake.

Just Today You Could Say

(C) R.L.K.

dawn's hid, wind's
    a chilly one;
      rained yesterday,
      raining today -
         streets fit to swim in,

no place for
   passers-by,
      but don't we all pass by,
      try
         to live

in these
   swift-fading days,
      hours,
      moments of wind
         and rain

Sialia Sialis

(A Short Syllabic)
(C) R.L.K.

"It is equally possible to take the bare present image

 as the worthless momentary picture in the whole temporal world,

 and as the true world among shadows. -- L. Wittgenstein

Blue upon blue:
bright birds curving
and gliding in
a noonday sky.

As in an Ordinary Month

(Tanka Times Three)

(C) R.L.K.

1.
Silvery moonlight
pouring down on the sand dunes;
Our summer's gone, but
there are nights when I can still
hear soft laughter on the shore.

2.
Cold and gray. Thin mist
surrounding gnarled old trees.
A small bird scurries,
shadowless under stratus:
here, then there, then gone away.

3.
Just one of those days:
sitting on the back porch with
little to do but
watch the clouds part and the sky
turn blue after the rain ends.