No Message Haiku

the weight

of slate-gray clouds

no message

2025 ONE ART Haiku Anthology

Good Friday Haiku

Good Friday afternoon

the white church steeple's shadow

darkens a stray

NeverEnding Story, April 18 2025

FYI: This haiku could be read as a prequel to the following:

whitewashed church

on the street corner a black man

with a crown of thorns

NeverEnding Story, October 5 2022

FYI: Ls 2&3 allude to "Black Jesus."  Black theology envisions Jesus Christ as one who stands on the side of the oppressed people, blacks, and is one with them, over against the oppressor.

Last Bite of Bread Haiku

Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CLXXV: "last bite of bread"

last bite of bread ...

with eyes fixed on Heaven

a girl starts singing 

NeverEnding Story, April 17 2025

FYI: NeverEnding Story's Special Feature: Selected Poems for Reflections on UN Statement: Gaza's Humanitarian Crisis at Its Worst Since War Began

The world that refused to lift your dead face from the ruins

was never interested in looking at it when it was alive

-- Mohammed Moussa

Added: Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CLXXV: "armless boy"

pile after pile

of shattered concrete and rebar ...

silhouetted

against Gaza's red-tinted skies

an armless boy and his dog 

Promised Land Tanka

Re-Homing in the Maple Land, XXXVIII

in this promised land

my immigrant life compressed

to hard working 

and light sleeping between jobs ... 

fresh morning in my broken world 

NeverEnding Story, April 16 2025 

FYI: L5 alludes to the following lines:

...

it is a serious thing

just to be alive

on this fresh morning

in the broken world.

I beg of you...

Mary Oliver, "Invitation," Red Bird, 2009

Added: Re-Homing in the Maple Land, XXXIX

stringing 

and unstringing this old erhu ...

My Hometown

the song I come to sing

remains sung in my heart

Added: 

a riot of colors

in my neighbor's garden

at its edge

Foreclosure tilted 

in breezy sunshine

Added:

a long lineup

at the recycling station

in his cart

empty bottles and cans 

taller than this street kid

Added: Trump Empire, Inc., XXIII

shoulder to shoulder

protesters chant, Not Our King!

holding a giant banner,

Vladimir Putin walks

Donald Trump on a leash

Added:

in his $50,000 

three-bedroom ranch-style rental home

the Richest Man sneers

homeless men? Just drug zombies, 

needles and human feces on the street

FYI: Yahoo! Finance, April 4: Elon Musk sold his seven mansions for more than $100 million and now lives in a $50,000 three-bedroom ranch-style rental home in Boca Chica, Texas

And The Independent, Dec. 13, 2024: Elon Musk calls homelessness a ‘lie’ and ‘propaganda’ — and Trump is listening

“Homeless is a misnomer. It implies that someone got a little bit behind on their mortgage, and if you just gave them a job, they’d be back on their feet,” he told former Fox News personality Tucker Carlson in October. “What you actually have are violent drug zombies with dead eyes, and needles and human feces on the street.”

The more money spent combating homelessness, “the worse it gets”, according to Musk.

Tunnel of Pink Blossoms Haiku

dappled sunshine

kid after kid through a tunnel

of pink blossoms

Romanian Translation by Editor Steliana Cristina Voicu

soare pătat

copil după copil printr-un tunel

de flori roz

Enchanted Garden, 11, 2025

Joy and Sadness Tanka

The Great Gatsby

turning 100 sparks joy

and sadness ...

my bookworm friend laments,

this desire for more, more, more

NeverEnding Story, April 14 2025

FYI: The Great Gatsby, which turned a hundred last week, is a novel about excess: about the glitzy, rowdy parties of the Jazz Age and the beautiful people that attended them; about vanity and class; and about the insatiable American desire for more ...( The New Yorker, April 9: "F. Scott Fitzgerald's Life in Drinks") 

And the following tanka could be read as an example of this insatiable American desire for more articulated in The Great Gatsby:

alone 

by the penthouse window

my friend repeats 

this is America

why settle for pretty good? 

NeverEnding Story, September 19 2022

Patch of Green Haiku

March sunshine

my old dog sniffs a patch

of green

Sense & Sensibility, March 2025

Relationship is not about continuing

"It's about re-inventing," I reassure myself. Always being at the brink of making something new.

I shaved my head

when her hair started falling out

and we weren't scared ...

five years later, our life bears

the weight of a question mark

I'm sleepless again as the moonlight slants through a gap in the bedroom curtains. And in her sleep, she seems to murmur something about a stable life.

It aches when I close my eyes and let myself glimpse, just for a moment, that there is an alternative life in reality, not just inside my mind: carefree and always on the move.

awake, alone

I look out the window

at early snowfall ...

what if this, what if that swirling

in a dark corner of my mind

Contemporary Haibun Online, 21:1, 2025

Marriage Life Tanka

in my mind

you shouldn't get married

loud and louder ...

we're like two vacuum cleaners

sucking at each other

Cold Moon Journal, February 14 2025

Life goes on behind the wall

the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CLXXIV: "wall of indifference"

Life goes on behind the wall

written in response to Haaretz, Opinion, April 9: "This Intolerable Gap Between Jewish Memory and Palestinian Reality" and in memory of 15 executed aid workers

anything new 

on the other side of this wall

of indifference ...

15 aid workers bound

and shot at close range

the young medic 

with a penetrating gaze

at smoke-darkened skies ...

his last phone message: the path

I chose to help people

too much to ask you 

to see Gazans as humans? 

50, 000 deaths

silenced, forgotten, buried

under the weight of daily life

NeverEnding Story, April 10 2025

FYI: Listen to Harrteza's April 8 podcast interview with Nir Hasson: 'I Don't Know of Any IDF Soldier Who Paid a Price for Killing Innocents in Gaza'

Haaretz journalist Nir Hasson has been covering the war in Gaza for months. He has seen so many horrifying acts of war go unpunished and uninvestigated, that he was hardly surprised by the killing of 15 aid workers at the end of March.

Added: Trump Empire, Inc., XX

tariff after tariff ...

another food bank lineup curls

around the corner

Added: Trump Empire, Inc., XXI

the garbage bin 

near the Fiction Section 

of a dollar bookstore

piles on piles of copies 

of Trump: The Art of the Deal

FYI: Yahoo! Finance, Oct. 13, 2020: As a businessman, Donald Trump ran 6 businesses that declared bankruptcy because they couldn’t pay their bills. 

We’re watching Trump’s 7th bankruptcy unfold

And CoinDesk, April 11: Donald Trump's Memecoin Faces Massive $320M Token Unlock Amid Record Low Price, having lost 83% of its value since Jan. 18.

Added: Trump Empire, Inc., XXII

"Kiss my ass!"

he brags, going with his gut 

and the world's forced to go along 

for this roller coaster ride ...

Trump’s 7th bankruptcy unfolds

Added: the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CLXXIV: "Seder and mass grave"

an empty chair

at the Passover Seder

100 miles away

in a mass grave bodies found

in paramedic uniforms

FYI: This tanka could be read as a sequel to the following:

Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, LVII: "Passover"

headlines bleed

into this sunlit suburb

on Passover

chants of Free Hostages

mingle with Free Palestine

NeverEnding Story, April 23 2024 

Winter Ocean Haiku

wind-torn clouds

the surging winter ocean

between mom and me

Wales Haiku Journal, Winter 2024/25 

Against Trumpinator

Trump Empire, Inc., XVII

patho-cracy ...

my ESL teacher whispers

then puts her finger 

to her mouth as USA! chants 

grow sharp and darker outside

wecan'twaitfor 

$5, 000 made-in-USA

iPhones. iPhones now ...

flanked by a spray of flags

red-hattedTrumpists shouting

 

tariffs, a tax cut 

for working Americans

louder from TV

in gathering dark, she mutters

my 401K, now 401

Land of the Crazed --> USA

Canada <-- Home of the Brave

a giant road sign

at the corner near the border

as flocks of geese fly north

in Toronto sunshine

with the scent of early spring

and freedom

two Americans meet and part:

one draft dodger, one Trump evader

Hands Off Rally:

chant after chant of fried truth

eggflation

scrambled justice, poached rights,

cracked democracy... Trump, Fuck Off

NeverEnding Story, April 8 2025

FYI: Trumpinator,  Donald Trump as the Terminator, is a MAGA codeword.

ESL stands for English as a Second Language.

The Polish psychiatrist Andrew Lobaczewski coined this term, "pathocracy," to describe a type of governance by a small pathological minority that takes control over a society. 

And a 401(k) is a retirement savings plan in the US

Note: My translation project, NeverEnding Story:First English-Chinese Bilingual Haiku and Tanka Blog,  reached a new milestone yesterday at midnight:

the HIGEST daily page views, 23, 802

on the windowsill

two bluebirds singing

to each other

I tweet and retweet

"NeverEnding Story" (most-read haiku and tanka poetry blog) 👍

Now, it calls for haiku and tanka submissions. See the guidelines here.

We read to know we're "not alone."

-- The character of C.S. Lewis in William Nicholson's play, "Shadowlands" 

The proper response to a poem is "another poem."

-- Phyllis Webb 

Added: Trump Empire, Inc., XVIII

White House news on mute

shaft after shaft of sunlight

through rainclouds

Added: the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CLXXIII: "15 aid workers executed"

aid workers bound and shot

the s t  r   e  t   c    h of silence

after silence

Added: Trump Empire, Inc., XIX

the stocks rocketing

downward, upward, downward ...

Trump brags, kissing my ass

Beachcomber Haiku

first-time beachcomber

the slow coming and going

of foam flowers

 

Wales Haiku Journal, Winter 2024/25 

Adrift

the sound of leaves

crunching under my feet ...

laid off

the stop, go, stop

of this gig work life ...

rush hour traffic

last bus ride

office tower shadows drift

across my tired face

long time no see ...

plumes of breath between me

and my former boss

laid off again ...

I gaze at the winter skies

one cloud at a time

Frogpond, 48:1, Winter 2025

Editors' Comments: Nicholas Klacsanzky says the variation “has depth with tones of spirituality and different layers of meaning. And Jacob D. Salzer appreciate your honesty and crisp images, and your emotional vulnerability in this piece. 

Doll Drifting Haiku

moonlight

in wave after wave

a doll drifting

Frogpond, 48:1, Winter 2025

Sin Haiku

This Brave New World, CXXI

spiral razor wire

along the white church wall

Sin Is Everywhere

NeverEnding Story, April 2025

FYI: In Christian theology, "missing the mark" (or "hamartia" in Greek) is a metaphor for sin, signifying failing to meet God's standards or purpose.

And Matthew 24:12-13

12 Sin will be rampant everywhere, and the love of many will grow cold. 13 But the one who endures to the end will be saved. 

This haiku could be read as a prequel to the following:

no one for miles

the billboard declares

SIN IS EVERYWHERE

Raw Nervz Haiku, 7: 2, Summer 2001

LeRoy Gorman 

Added:

a flock of seagulls

between ocean and sky

the touch of breeze

Added:

the unspoken

gnaw into our regret

For Sale sign

Added:

her eyes' warmth 

through bulletproof glass

jail guard's stare

Wax Museum Senryu

the room

full of selfie sticks

wax museum 

Cafe Haiku, March 10, 2025

Tai Chi Master Haiku

city park at dawn

I jog from one tai chi master

to another

Cafe Haiku, March 10, 2025

Here and Now Haiku

Grand Canyon sunrise ...

learning to love

here and now

Cafe Haiku, March 10, 2025

The Prices We Pay

claim denial ...

this numbness outside

this anger inside

deny, delay, depose

etched on blood-stained shell casings

gathering dark

one less CEO ...

half awake to this Promised Land

grievance-shadowed

A haunting voice echoes in my mind, "I don't wish anyone harm, but when a CEO routinely brought in revenue of over $100 billion for a health insurance company with the highest claim-denial rate, double the industry average, it's hard to feel sad about his violent death. He spent his life making money by increasing the suffering of everyday Americans. Now, I just follow his lead of indifference."

Haiku Canada Review, 19:1, 2025