Enemy's Eyes Senryu

my enemy's eyes

stare at me in the mirror:

this gray-haired dreamer

5-7-5 Haiku Journal, April 21, 2025

Melting Clock Haiku

Between Heaven and Hell, IV

first magical realist haiku

wall-to-wall mirrors

in his presidential suite ...

a melting clock ticks

NeverEnding Story, November 16 2024

FYI: "Magic realism or magical realism is a "style of literary fiction and art. It paints a realistic view of the world while also adding magical elements, often blurring the lines between fantasy and reality...excerpted from my "To the Lighthouse" post, Magical Realism in Times of Crises"

Added: Between Heaven and Hell, V

post-election blues ...

yet the stump jagged with some twigs

stretching upward

Added: Against the Drowning Noise of Other Words, CXXIV: "armless Gazan"

smoky sunbeams 

through tattered olive trees ...

an armless Gazan

Added: Between Heaven and Hell, VI

ka-kis-to-cracy ...

my English teacher's voice

quivering

as U-S-A! chants get louder

from the crowd outside the school

FYI: The first part of the word comes from the Greek kákisto(s), meaning “worst.” So kakistocracy means “government by the worst.” The earliest known use of the word was in the 1600s by Paul Gosnold, a loyalist to King Charles I during the English Civil War.

And Daily Beast, Nov. 21: Jon Stewart Knows Why Trump Is Picking All the Worst People for His Cabinet

For Trump, it’s not a “downside” that his Cabinet picks “will not be sufficient stewards of these agencies,” Stewart said on the latest episode of his Weekly Show podcast. The point is that they are trying to “dismantle” the agencies themselves.

Added: Between Heaven and Hell, VII

in morning chill

a youth's gaze at the billboard

dripping red:

your body, My choice painted

over my body, my choice

FYI: The New Yorker, Nov.14: A New Rallying Cry for the Irony-Poisoned Right: It took less than twenty-four hours after Trump’s reëlection for young men to take up a slogan that could define the coming era of gendered regression: “Your body, my choice.”

PBS, Oct.31: Trump: I will 'protect the women' ... 'like it or not'

And The Indian Express, Nov.17: ‘Your Body, My Choice’ vs 4B movement: The radical movement is an answer to the clock turning back

The movement consists of four ‘nos’ — no dating, no sex, no marriage, and no childbearing. It is a radical approach, but perhaps one whose time has come given the tumultuous fight for bodily autonomy American women have been undergoing.

Added: Between Heaven and Hell, VIII

written in response to CNN News, Nov.18: "With swastika flags and bellowed slurs, neo-Nazi marchers strode through Columbus. Ohio" (J.D. Vance's home state)

Back in Business

It's Cleanup Time!

dripping red paint ...

I turn away when MAGA men

stab me with their eyes

The President and His Wall-to-Wall Mirrors Tanka

inspired by the diagnosis  psychologist and author of Too Much and Never Enough, Mary Trump, gave on Nov. 9

he won only

in the eyes of fake-news media ...

in shadowy light

the President cries out 

to his wall-to-wall mirrors

PoemHunter, November 17 2020

A New Year of the Same Old

the year dying
nothing in this rented room
but my old dog

year's end
a mix of rain and snow
darkens the night

midnight countdown
staring at me a stranger
in the mirror

NeverEnding Story, December 31, 2019

Father and Me Tanka

this misty night
I hold up a mirror
to myself ...
(what's the difference
between my father and me?)

NeverEnding Story, June 16, 2019

Selected Tanka: Ceremony Tanka

for naturalized Canadians

before the ceremony
I stand in front of the mirror…
my Chinese self
here in yesterday's dream
gone in today's mist

German Translation by Tony Böhle

für eingebürgerte Kanadier

vor der Zeremonie
stehe ich vor dem Spiegel…
mein chinesisches Ich
hier aus den Träumen von Gestern
gegangen in den Nebel von Heute

Featured Poet, Einunddreissig, November 2015

Mardi Gras Mask Tanka

I live alone
locked in the ghostly past ...
the face in the mirror
as foreign to me
as a Mardi Gras mask

Gusts, 27, Spring/Summer2018

Selected Tanka: New Year’s Sunrise Tanka

New Year’s sunrise  ...
I see in the mirror
the face
I was afraid of
as a teenager

Bright Stars, II, 2014

Selected Tanka: New Immigrant Tanka

a new immigrant
in the land of Snow White
I practice
A,B,C ... by talking
to the bathroom mirror

Atlas Poetica, 15, 2013

Warmth of Your Breath Tanka

I wake slowly
to the warmth of your breath
on my neck ...
our bedroom mirror
catching the sunlight

Kokako, 27, 2017

Drunk Tanka

a drunk cursing
at the midnight moon
my tired face
in the mirror
of a slot-machine

Neon Graffiti:Tanka of Urban Life, 2016

Selected Tanka Prose: Old Photos of the Future

At dusk I sit in front of my computer reflecting upon the bright, promising smiles of my childhood, youth, and early thirties. I scan them one by one.

in the photos

we have ceased to be

the same…

I am his outcome

he, my memory

The setting sun sinks slowly on my glasses, and in the deep of the computer screen a gloomy and bemused face is mirrored.

Pirene's Fountain, 4:9, April 2011

Selected Haiku Sequence: A Life in Four Seasons

I write her
one poem every day
spring dewdrops

a butterfly
tattooed on her buttock
summer heat

autumn dawn
before the mirror I count
gray hairs

snow on snow
thoughts of her emerge
one at a time

Frogpond, 34:1, Winter 2011

Note:  In celebration of the upcoming 7th anniversary of being a published writer of Japanese short form poetry, I am pleased to announce a new publishing project, Selected Haiku Sequence by Chen-ou Liu.

Selected Senryu: Black Clothes Senryu

zazen --
the wall mirror is covered
with black clothes

Chinese Translation

襌坐…
牆上的鏡子覆蓋著
黑布

Haiku Pix Review, 1, Winter 2011

Selected Kyoka: June Frog Kyoka

I rehearse
my first speech
in front of a mirror --
a June frog
sings to an admiring bog

Gusts, 11, Spring/Summer 2010

Selected Kyoka: Life Work kyoka

gazing
upon you in the mirror
I utter
I love you
you are my life's work    

Ribbons, 6:1, Spring 2010

Ticking Clock Tanka

the ticking clock
gets louder and louder...
awake to see
an old man in the mirror
who dreams away his life

Bamboo Hut, Spring 2015

Death Tanka

in the depth
of a winter night
I peer
into the mirror:
Death with half-closed eyes

VerseWrights, November 2014

Daytime Saving Tanka

turning
the clock ahead one hour
for daylight saving—
in the bedroom mirror
I see a patch of gray hair

Bright Stars, VII, 2014

Bathroom Mirror Haiku

I kiss myself
in the bathroom mirror
New Year morning

Haiku Canada Review, 8:2, October 2014