A sleepless night... The haijin
rummages in the kitchen for poems.

Overloaded, the chug-thug of the washer
across the kitchen floor.

Across the kitchen tile, a family
of roaches scurries for cover.

beneath the moon
a cemetery dance
til dawn

the first bone-cracking cry
of the newly born
earth shivers

as the blood
begins to flow
earth quickens

Into the puddle       red galoshes
              a purple       party dress

first rain of spring       a child excited by
      yellow-petaled       weeds

                left behind       in the storm
the cup of green tea       now fermented

                gust of wind       dandelion tufts
flow up a child's nose       achoo!