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Category: Massachusetts

haiku: Tanglewood Evening

Tanglewood Evening

on the lawn our attention
drawn to one woman coughing
as the pianist plays

***

four low voices slip
across the manicured grass
a warbler enters from the trees

***

air heavy with citronella
the pop of a cork
during the applause

***

a lone student’s violent end
transformed into melody
all breaths are held

///

Bastille Day
14 July 2022
Ozawa Hall lawn
Tanglewood
Lenox MA

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haiku: 13 July 2022

sunlight on the water
children’s laughter
Fleetwood Mac vs Kane Brown

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13 July 2022
Onota Lake
Pittsfield MA

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POEM: Fitchburg Metta Sutta

Fitchburg Metta Sutta

Kannon Bodhisattva looks down on my van
as I pass below an outcrop of rock
so I do a u-turn & head back for a visit.
The Vietnamese Buddhist temple sits on a steep
hill overlooking a small post-industrial town
somewhere near the middle of Massachusetts.
A journey of two thousand five hundred years
from India to China to Vietnam to the U.S.
ends in the driveway of a 19th-century house
that’s been put to a new use.
Kannon is the embodiment of compassion;
a being who has reached enlightment
but has chosen instead to stay here
with the rest of us until we can go, too.
That kind of work needs to be done everywhere,
& Fitchburg, Mass. is as good as anywhere else.
I walk around the building taking photos
of the statues & the flowers & the signs
(none of which I can read) & then I stop
& bow before Kannon to show my respect
& because I could use some compassion.
A light rain begins to fall.

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6 July 2022
Pittsfield MA

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haiku: 2 July 2022

I save my place
in a dead poet’s words
with a goose’s lost feather

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2 July 2022
Wahconah Falls State Park
Dalton MA

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haiku: 1 July 2022

black squirrel on the trail
surfaces distant memories
of summer in Japan

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1 July 2022
Appalachian Trail
near Dalton MA

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haiku: 30 June 2022

little bag of popcorn
on a bench under a tree
no I don’t know which kind

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30 June 2022
Pittsfield MA

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