HAIKAI (2)
By:
June 3, 2023
One in a series of haikai by HILOBROW friend and contributor Charlie Mitchell. (Haikai are informal, spontaneous collections of linked haiku-like poems.)
THE NORTH RUSTS IN MAY
pause to taste Dasein
thought cant ripping like cheap beer
In stoplight silence.
world-killing traffic
‘someone better’ve died,’ like a
sun god sacrifice.
knees of jeans soaked through
by sallow grass of thaw mud
memories’ kind reek.
parking lot franchise
dog lopes through weed-riven wastes
pipe-burst oasis.
a brick split center
out gnarls rude life against man
well-trod poetry.
rancid nalgene mouth
shallow river with sand bed
toes writhe in kelp nets.
banjo cuts my sides
in rail ruins and lilac blooms
the sky washed azure.
MORE CHARLIE MITCHELL: A FANTASY LAND (story) | SENTINELS (story) | JACKALOPE (story). MORE POETRY: Stephanie Burt’s WE ARE MERMAIDS | James Parker’s BOURNE VARIATIONS | James Parker’s KALEVALA bastardizations | Damon Krukowski’s NEVER BEGIN TO SING | Douglas Wolk’s LIMERICKANIA | Franklin Bruno’s ADEQUATED | John Holbo’s ON BEYOND ZARATHUSTRA | Greg Rowland’s MY FIRST CRITICAL THEORY ABC | Matthew Battles’s ESSAY ON MAN.