Chen-ou Liu's Translation Project: First English-Chinese Haiku and Tanka Blog

Saturday, August 6, 2016

Selected Haibun: Sunday Afternoon

A haibun for Benny

... millions long for immortality who don't know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon.
― Susan Ertz

rain on the roof ...
he wonders
how to kill time

A gray screen suddenly pops into the scene of a dark alleyway as muffled footsteps approach a door. The door is left slightly open. The shaky, hand-held camcorder captures a cat that is let out of the house. Pan to a teenage boy standing nearby and pan back to the cat. A hand-held gun appears in the frame and is pressed toward the cat's forehead. Zoom-in. The gun is fired; the cat falls to the ground. The camcorder closely follows the cat's convulsing body.

Simply Haiku, 8:3, Winter 2011