for the Nick Virgilio Haiku Assoc.

originally written during the Virgilio Memorial Reading, June 2006, & a tanka:

memorial reading:
in between Walt Whitman
and Virgilio
an egret, steadfast--
pure white & naked

tanka

we lean

into one another's
broken parts
a pair of thrush
rebuild their nest


*for Inky

alone
gazing out upon
the breakwater
everything I've lost
everything I've birthed




sharing love
with another child
I count
the different shapes
of each snowflake





an iris
trapped in a vase
like love
there are things
we never wanted

knapsack
and cane pole
I search
the pond's edge
for an answer

a hopi carves
the kachina from cottonwood
my roots too
are plucked like shavings
from the whittler's knife

note: the Hopi are an south western Native American Tribe, a Kachina is a doll.