Green Bill Haiku

March snowstorm

the prime minister drones on

through the Green Bill

Sense & Sensibility, March 2026

Fire Poppies Haiku

months after the fire

these hills blowing with poppies!

fire poppies ablaze

Haiku Avenue, 9, 2025

FYI: Papaver californicum, a species of poppy known by its common name fire poppy, only grows on the heels of major fires.   

Coal-Soot Haze Haiku

No More Fairy Tales, XLIX

coal-soot haze hangs 

over a field of farmhouses

Four More Years crooked

NeverEnding Story, March 10 2026

FYI: This haiku could be read as a sequel to mine below:

clean coal billboard ...

a fork-tongued thought 

darkens the night

Plum Tree Tavern, January 21, 2023

Added: No More Fairy Tales, L

rows of wind turbines

a field of prairie grass

bends in twilight

FYI: This haiku could be read as a sequel to my tanka below:

No More Fairy Tales, XLVIII

COP30:

more fossil fuels

or green energy?

a question smeared in ash

from the burned Amazon

NeverEnding Story, November 21 2025

Added: Trump Empire, Inc, LXXXVI

in gold-color

Trump holds Epstein’s stretched arms

from behind

on the National Mall:

King of the World Statue

Added: Trump Empire, Inc, LXXXVII

the peanut-brained man

behind the Resolute Desk

grins to cameras,

"just a little excursion"

oily clouds over Tehran

Added:

billows of smoke

from Beirut neighborhoods ...

the war chief vows,

we will take the territory 

block by block, street by street

FYI: Haaretz, March 13 2026:  Defense Minister Israel Katz said Thursday morning that he had "warned" Lebanese President Joseph Aoun following Hezbollah fire toward Israel. "I warned the president of Lebanon that if the Lebanese government cannot control the territory and prevent Hezbollah from threatening the northern communities and firing at Israel – we will take the territory and do it ourselves," Katz said. 

Added: Politics of Distraction, I

oil-dark clouds

hang heavy over Tehran —

reporters squint

at row after row of black bars

in Epstein’s redacted files

FYI: Politics of Distraction is my new writing project. The title is taken from Al Jazeera: February 26, 2026: Epstein and the politics of distraction

Scandal individualises corruption, creating a spectacle that redirects anger away from structural power.

Climate Alarmist Talk Gembun

No more climate alarmist talk.

flashfloodingweareallinthistogether

floodafterfloodweareallinthis t o ge t h e r a gain

haikuKATHA, 49, 2025

COP30 Senryu

No More Fairy Tales, XLVII

columns of smoke

YAK, YAK, YAK, blah, blah, blah

at COP30

NeverEnding Story, November 21 2025

FYI: BBC News, Nov. 21, 2025: Fire breaks out at COP30 as conference closes And The Guardian, Nov. 21 2025: Cop30 delegates ‘far apart’ on phasing out fossil fuels and cutting carbon

Added: Trump Empire, Inc, LXIII:

oak leaves drift down

through the smokestack haze ...

America first

FYI: The Washington Post, Nov. 7, 2025: U.S. skips COP30 climate conference, lobbies to sink new global deals

The Trump administration is using lobbying and economic threats to thwart emissions-cutting and environmental initiatives around the world.

“We want to bring our arguments to our opponents,” Energy Secretary Chris Wright said, speaking at an energy summit on Oct. 22 hosted by the America First Policy Institute, a think tank aligned with Trump. “We’re going to come back to realistic views on energy, and President Trump is just all-in on American energy dominance. That’s a win not just for America, that’s a win for the world.” 

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XLVIII

COP30:

more fossil fuels

or green energy?

a question smeared in ash

from the burned Amazon

FYI: Rainforest Foundation, US: "Fire in the Amazon"

In 2024, fires were the largest driver of forest loss in the Amazon, ravaging an area larger than California in Brazil alone...

Between January and October 2025, fires burned 7.5 million acres (3 million hectares) of Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, about 39 times the land area of New York City.

Melted Rainbows Haiku

the melted rainbows 

in a gasoline puddle

the smell of summer

5-7-5 Haiku Journal, July 3, 2025

Smoky Silence Haiku

smoky silence

crater after crater

rainbowed with oil

NeverEnding Story, August 22 2025

Added:

elbows up, elbows down ...

the PM's mouth opens and closes

in summer heat

FYI: CBC News, August 22, 2025: Unfortunately, there may not be a hockey analogy for the challenge Canada faces: Are Mark Carney's elbows up or down? Does it matter?

"There is a time in a game, in a big game — and this is a big game — when you go hard in the corners with your elbows up. There's a time in the game when you drop your gloves in the first period and you send a message. And we've done that, pretty uniquely in the world," Carney responded, attempting to broaden the hockey analogy.

Added:

berry picking

I lick the stains

off her fingers

Added:

after our picnic

the heat comes on

between us

the honey melon juice

dripping off the table edge

Garbage Mountain Tanka

the sound of summer

one flock after another

of seagulls

gathering, parting

as the garbage mountain shimmers

Each in Our Own Way, 2024 Tanka Society of America Members' Anthology

Toy Forest Tanka

Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CC: "US-made bombs"

a toy forest

in his biscuit tin ...

the boy holds it tight

as US-made bombs drop

silencing the world below

NeverEnding Story, July 11 2025

FYI: The following entry could be read as its sequel

CLXXXI: "things hidden in ears"

inspired by Mosab Abu Toha's poem, "Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear"

doctor, you may find

these things hidden in my ears

a boy murmurs ...

buzzing of drones, roar of fighter jets

screams of Gazans, living and dead

NeverEnding Story, May 6 2025

And FYI: The Guardian, March 29, 2024:‘Ecocide in Gaza’: does scale of environmental destruction amount to a war crime? 

Satellite analysis revealed to the Guardian shows farms devastated and nearly half of the territory’s trees razed. Alongside mounting air and water pollution, experts says Israel’s onslaught on Gaza’s ecosystems has made the area unlivable

Added: Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CCI: "US-made bombs"

this shifting maze

of green and red zones in Gaza...

life and death 

measured in footsteps

across one rubble-lined "street"

FYI: The Nation, July 9, 2025: The Impossible Geography of Survival in Gaza

Israel has created “green zones” and “red zones” to distinguish between safe and dangerous areas. There’s little difference.

Added: Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CCII: "the Palestinian key"

a Gazan man

murmurs to himself

a dream, and yet ...

his ten-year-old bloodied son

holds the key tight and tighter 

FYI: Many Palestinians kept the keys to their homes when they were forced into exile in 1948. The Palestinian key is a potent symbol of their homes lost in the Nakba, often used in the protests. 

And "Israel's oldest and most progressive daily founded in 1918, Haaretz," which was was sanctioned by the Israeli government on Nov. 24, 2024

Editorial, July 16, 2025: As the Bodies Pile Up, the Israeli Public Remains Indifferent to the Daily Killing in Gaza

Since the end of the cease-fire on March 18, at least 7,261 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip.

Added: Trump Empire, Inc, XLV

tariffs today

TACO tomorrow ... in heat

a stray chases its tail 

FYI: Trump Always Chickens Out (TACO), also known as the TACO Trade.

Garbage Mountain Tanka

the sound of summer

one flock after another

of seagulls

gathering, parting

as the garbage mountain shimmers

TSA Members' Anthology, 2025

Valley of Smoke Tanka

No More Fairy Tales, XL

the morning sun

choked out by columns of black ...

car after car 

driving through the valley of smoke

as tongues of fire leap behind

NeverEnding Story, February 10 2025

FYI: My haiku below could be read as a sequel:

No More Fairy Tales, VI

tongues of forest fires 

there's no Plan[et] B, the rest

blah, blah, blah ...

NeverEnding Story, November 21 2022 

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XLI

morning sun barely seen street after street charred by the frames

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XLII

tongues of flame

grow longer and wilder

with raging hate and lies ...

a raven's kraa-kraa-kraa

atop the Mar-a-Lago flagpole

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XLIII

a stairway

what remains of a burned house ...

Pacific Coast sunset

FYI: The following haiku with a prefatory note could be read as a sequel: 

On my return from Tsukushi at the close of March, I found that my hut had been destroyed by fire. Looking at the ruins, I composed this verse.

violets here and there

in the ruins 

of my burnt house

Haiku Mind: 108 Poems to Cultivate Awareness and Open Your Heart

Shokyu-ni

Added:

patches of fog

shroud this orphanage ...

un/knowing the past

FYI: This haiku could be read as a sequel of my haiku below:

jigsaw puzzle:

group-home kids piece together

“American Dream”

Touch of a Moth: 2012 Haiku Canada Members' Anthology

(Note: American Dream is FX Schmid's award-winning 750-piece jigsaw puzzle)

hand-me-down dream

twilight laughter drifting

from the orphanage

Whispers, Oct. 2015

Man-Child Tanka

Game Show, 2024, LXXI

this man-child fullmouths

frack and drill, baby, frack and drill

with a meaty smile ...

I turn off the TV, gazing

at cracked corners of my world

NeverEnding Story, November 3 2024

For more about Donald Trump being a man-child, see PopMatters, Feb.9, 2017: The Spoiled Little Man-Child They Made King: Celebrity, Richard II, and Donald Trump.

And Special Feature: Selected Tanka for Reflections on This Convicted Felon and Man-Child, Donald Trump

Added: Game Show, 2024, LXXII

Trump fan and foe

face to face

in stony silence

at the anti/rally

their cars kissed passionately

Wildfire Haze Haiku

wildfire haze ...

the raven's kraa-kraa-kraa

darkens

Wales Haiku Journal, Summer 2024

Trump Bikini Senryu

Game Show, 2024, LIV

this past May the hottest ever Trump Bikini

NeverEnding Story, June 13 2024 

FYI: this smokin' hot summer swimwear, FREE delivery on $35 shipped by Amazon

The Guardian, June 10: Trump vows to ‘drill, baby, drill’ despite rally attendees wilting in extreme heat

Supporters hospitalized following rallies in Las Vegas and Phoenix, where temperatures have broken records

And TomDispatch, June 13: Losing Our Cool in the Twenty-First Century

The world’s hot future has already arrived in parts of the Global South, thanks largely to past greenhouse gas emissions mainly from the Global North. On May 29th, in Delhi, India, residents suffered under record-melting 127-degree heat. Earlier in May, deadly heat descended on Southeast Asia. The heat index (the “feels like” temperature that takes humidity into account) exceeded 125 degrees in both Manila and Bangkok this spring, thereby “rewriting climatic history,” according to experts.

Added: This Brave New World, CXIV

wave after wave of heat

the book about book bans

banned in Florida

FYI: The Guardian, June 11 2024: Book about book bans banned by Florida school board

Ban This Book by Alan Gratz banned in Indian River county after opposition from parents linked to Moms for Liberty

In a statement to the Tallahassee Democrat, Gratz noted the irony of his book being banned.

“They banned the book because it talks about the books that they have banned and because it talks about book banning,” he said. “It feels like they know exactly what they’re doing and they’re somewhat ashamed of what they’re doing and they don’t want a book on the shelves that calls them out.”

Book bans have picked up steam in recent years and not shown any sign of slowing down. In fact, the American Library Association issued data earlier this year that noted there had been a massive uptick in the number of titles targeted for censorship at public libraries in the US in 2023. The number of titles targeted for censorship increased by 92% over the previous year (2022), accounting for about 46% of all book challenges in 2023.

The data also noted that there had been 4,240 unique book titles targeted for censorship, as well as 1,247 demands to censor library books, materials and resources in 2023.

Towers of Plastic Bottles Haiku

No More Fairy Tales, XXVIII

written in response to the climate summit held in Ottawa, Canada to create a "legally-binding plastic pollution instrument through the United Nations."

entrance to UN's summit

row upon row of towers

of plastic bottles

NeverEnding Story, April 22, 2024

FYI:

“We won’t ban our way out of plastic pollution, we won’t recycle our way out of plastic pollution, and we won’t reuse our way out of plastic pollution. We need to do a better job of all these things at different steps and different types of plastics,” Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault said at the conference Tuesday.

-- Global News, April 23: What UN plastic waste treaty talks in Ottawa want: ‘Won’t recycle our way out.’ 

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XXIX

Earth Day

this childhood river now a stream

going nowhere

Spring Day Mural Haiku

No More Fairy Tales, XXVII

spring day mural:

green paint sprayed across the wall

behind leafless trees

NeverEnding Story, March 212024

FYI: A definition haiku or tanka, a subgenre of definition poetry, begins or ends with a short phrase or statement, followed or preceded by a description of the phrase or statement in concrete imagery. The visually and emotionally suggestive power of a definition haiku or tanka is NOT rooted in the explanatory relationship between its two parts, but in the "dialectical relationship" between them.

For more examples about "definition haiku," see To the Lighthouse: Definition Haiku and Tanka

Added:

mayor's office:

"Yes, We Can"  hangs in the frame 

above the desk

and reed orchids languish

in a dusty corner

Added: 

engineering 101:

not a tunnel 

of icy-dark equations 

but an AI-lit foundry

of 3-D ideas

Cop-Out Tanka

No More Fairy Tales, XXIII

written on the eve of COP28 hosted by Sultan al-Jabe, the Oil Chief of the U.A.E., a petrostate which is one of the hottest places on Earth.

Dubai skyline

silhouetted against sunset

private jet

after private jet landing

for a climate cop-out

NeverEnding Story, November 29 2023

Note: Note: This is a sequel to my COP27 tanka below:

written to this "ridiculously photogenic" Talker, Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada, the fourth most polluting country per capita in 2022, a country of gas-guzzling car enthusiasts.

COP 1, 2, 3 ...

these endless climate talks 

like crows' caw-caw-caw --

between Canada's plan and action

this Nunavut-sized gap

NeverEnding Story, November 6, 2022

FYI: CBC News, Nov.27: COP28 host used climate talks to push for oilpatch deals, including in Canada: Leaked briefing documents reveal plans to discuss fossil fuel projects with 15 nations.

The Tyee, Nov. 29: Danielle Smith Heads to COP28 to Sell Fossil Fuels: Premier plans to pitch carbon capture and Alberta’s ‘clean’ oil and gas at climate summit.

And The New Yorker, Nov. 25: The Road to Dubai: The latest round of international climate negotiations is being held in a petrostate. What could go wrong?

...There have now been twenty-seven cops; this week marks the opening of the twenty-eighth, which will be held in Dubai. Over the years, everything cop-related has grown bigger and more elaborate. This year’s session is expected to attract some seventy thousand people—enough to populate a small city...As cop has grown and grown, so, too, of course, has the problem it’s supposed to address. In 1995, global carbon-dioxide emissions amounted to twenty-three billion metric tons. This year, the total is expected to be about thirty-seven billion tons, an increase of around sixty per cent. Meanwhile, cumulative emissions—which, from a climate perspective, are what count—have doubled. Among scientists, it is widely agreed that the planet is approaching critical “tipping points,” if it hasn’t already crossed them. “Life on planet Earth is under siege,” is how a recent scientific paper put it.

...“cops are the only place where the most vulnerable countries have a seat at the table,” Jennifer Morgan, Germany’s special envoy for international climate action, told me. “And that is so important because it changes the dynamics. It forces the largest emitters to sit across the table from countries like Vanuatu and listen to what it means if we don’t act.” (Vanuatu, in the South Pacific, is another country that could easily be wiped out by sea-level rise.)

And Global News. Dec. 1: A United Nations report criticized Canada last month, calling it the country with the widest gap between its promises and actual climate action. Now, Canada is pledging $16 million [merely a rounding error in the Canadian federal government budget] for a climate disaster fund. 

And The Guardian, Dec. 3: COP28 president says there is ‘no science’ behind demands for phase-out of fossil fuels

I’m not in any way signing up to any discussion that is alarmist. There is no science out there, or no scenario out there, that says that the phase-out of fossil fuel is what’s going to achieve 1.5C

-- Sultan Al Jaber , President of COP28 and Oil Chief of the U.A.E., a petrostate 

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XXIV

this weight

of something un/spoken

on TV

the world's largest iceberg 

breaks free, drifting somewhere

Note: This could be read as a prequel to my tanka below:

this world of reduction: 

of fingers lost to frostbite

of lives lost to depression ...

in the morning sunshine

another polar bear drifts off

PoemHunter, March 23 2022  

FYI: NewScientist, Nov. 27: Where is the iceberg that broke off Antarctica and is it a threat?

...An iceberg more than three [not four] times the size of New York City began drifting again after being stuck on the seafloor for nearly 40 years

Chad Greene at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California  says it is clear that icebergs are breaking off Antarctica at a faster rate than snow is adding mass to the ice, “meaning climate change is causing the Antarctic Ice Sheet to lose mass at a significant rate”.

Researchers have been shocked by recent climate extremes in Antarctica, including record-high temperatures and vast areas of missing sea ice, which serve to buffer the continent’s ice shelves from warmer water and waves.

And CTV News, Nov. 24: World's largest iceberg breaks free, heads toward Southern Ocean

It's rare to see an iceberg of this size on the move, said British Antarctic Survey glaciologist Oliver Marsh, so scientists will be watching its trajectory closely...an iceberg of this scale has the potential to survive for quite a long time in the Southern Ocean, even though it's much warmer, and it could make its way farther north up toward South Africa where it can disrupt shipping.

Added: This Brave New World, CXIV

children's blood

flows beyond the pages

of War and Peace

my friend's loss of passion

and of her writing dream

Added: This Brave New World, CXV

written on the eve of the ceasefire's end

the call to prayer 

a half-ruined mosque

in twilit Gaza

FYI: Reuters, Nov. 30: In Gaza, call to prayer rings out from bombarded mosque

Balanced on a steep slab of fissured concrete with rods of twisted metal poking out and the remnants of a dome slanted at a 45-degree angle behind him, a young muezzin in a baseball cap called Muslims to prayer from atop a bombarded mosque in Gaza.

September Sizzle Haiku

No More Fairy Tales, XXIII

this stillness

between a black bear and me

September sizzle

NeverEnding Story, September 6 2023

FYI: In recent years, bear sightings have been increasing in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), Guelph, London and other parts of southwestern Ontario.

And also CBC News, August 5: Bears, bears, everywhere in Prince George, British Columbia, Canada, as animals come to the city seeking food

It seems almost anywhere you go in Prince George right now, you might run into a black bear.

"We usually only have rare sightings. Now it is a daily occurrence."

The animals tend to be very site-specific, she says, moving to where food can be found.

Bowinn Ma, B.C.'s minister of emergency management and climate readiness, said at a press conference this week that parts of the province are seeing berry crop failure due to unprecedented drought, and that may be driving bears into cities seeking food.

That could be the case in Prince George, which had an unusually early spring and has sustained the highest average temperature on record for weeks, leading to Saskatoon berries and blueberries ripening and drying out weeks earlier than usual.

Added: Re-Homing in the Maple Land, X

this millionaire

flips house after house ...

not quite 30

and already his smile 

wider than Charlie Chaplin's

FYI: The Chaplin smile is unusual, produced by a muscle that most people can’t move deliberately. Charlie Chaplin could, for this smile, in which the lips angle upward much more sharply than they do in the felt smile, was his hallmark. It is a supercilious smile that smiles at smiling... excerpted from "The Science of Smiling" by Paul Ekman, psychologist and co-discoverer of micro expressions

And for more about character tanka, see To the Lighthouse: Character/Persona Tanka

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XXIV

Brazil cyclone

Europe floods and another

Earth heat record ....

the more I read, the more I'm stuck

in a corner of my mindscape

FYI: The American Psychological Association and ecoAmerica have defined eco-anxiety (aka climate anxiety) as “a chronic fear of environmental doom.” This fear can stem from direct experience of extreme weather events and environmental change (e.g., floods, forest fires, hurricanes, drought) or exposure to climate change information through news media and other sources... excerpted from Mental Health Commission of Canada, "Understanding and Coping with Eco-Anxiety," Apr 21, 2023

Added: Re-Homing in the Maple Land, XI

O Canada! Our home and native land!

leather-bound volumes

of parliamentary debates

stacked on shelves...

PM looks out the window

at pop-up tents on the street

your home, my home 

we're united for our common home

let's bring it home ....

the opposition leader chants 

to the clicking of cameras

FYI: CTV News, September 8: Pierre Poilievre pitches 'common sense' as Conservative policy convention kicks off, delegates energized

And Press progress, September 5: Big Real Estate Executives Among Top Donors to Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives.

Executives at big real estate companies profiting off and even driving up high real estate prices across Canada are listed as donors to the federal Conservative Party, Elections Canada records show.

What is worth more?

Art or life? Shouting with her fist raised in the air, the pink-haired climate activist turns around, throwing one can of tomato soup after another at Vincent van Gogh's Sunflowers. A pin-drop silence envelops the gallery.

She glances around the room for a moment or two, as though interested in these confused but curious people. Then with legs crossed, she sits silently on the floor and glues her hands to the wall. The clicking of cameras becomes loud ... and louder. 

beams of sunlight

a polar bear and her cub

drift on an ice-floe

Cattails, April 2023

Wind-Whipped Wildfires Haiku

No More Fairy Tales, XVI

wind-whipped wildfires

wave after wave of people fleeting 

into the ocean

NeverEnding Story, August 10 2023

FYI: NBC News, August 10: Maui fires live updates: At least 36 dead as thousands flee 'unprecedented' disaster: Crews continue to battle Maui and the Big Island fires, which have been fanned in part by strong winds from Hurricane Dora, a Category 4 storm.

And Democracy Now, August 11: Fire Expert Says Climate & Native Vegetation Changes Fueled Explosive Maui Wildfires

“This is something that is absolutely unprecedented,” says Clay Trauernicht, a professor in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management, University of Hawaii at Mānoa, where he focuses on wildland fire management in Hawaii and the Pacific. He explains how colonial landscape changes to the islands — prioritizing monocrop agriculture and land use for tourism — paired with the worsening atmospheric effects of climate change have set the conditions that sparked the devastating wildfires and allowed them to rage indiscriminately.

This haiku is a sequel to the following one:

No More Fairy Tales, XV

wave after wave of heat

please press ?

for more Q&As

NeverEnding Story, July 31 2023

And This haiku is a sequel to the following one:

No More Fairy Tales, VI

for Greta Thunberg

tongues of forest fires 

there's no Plan[et] B, the rest

blah, blah, blah ...

NeverEnding Story, November 21 2022

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XVII

Day and Night Quest

he runs with dogs

in his shorts and flip-flops ...

cloud after cloud

of smoke and ashes billowing 

over once-white-sand beaches

fleeing with dogs

through blaze after blaze

in gathering dark

he climbs up to the clifftop

while leaving his future behind

Added: No More Fairy Tales, XVIII

HR in red

scrawled on a half-burnt door ...

the barks 

of cadaver dogs

echo in the smoky twilight

FYI: HR stands for human remains. And Associated Press, August 13: As the death toll from a wildfire that razed a historic Maui town climbed to 93, authorities warned that the effort to find and identify the dead was still in its early stages. The blaze is already the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century. 

Added: Re-Homing in the Maple Land, VI

with his beagle

an air-guitar busker 

singing out loud

shoulda, coulda, woulda

story of my vagrant life

Added: Re-Homing in the Maple Land, VII

Billionaire Bunker

a man-made barrier island

in the Sunshine State ...

bathed in sweat, I ask my bunk-bed mate 

to turn off the TV and sleep

FYI: Fox Business, August 12: Jeff Bezos buys $68 million mansion in Miami's exclusive "Billionaire Bunker:"Jeff Bezos and fiancée, Lauren Sanchez, are expected to bulldoze the site and build a new mega mansion.