Jack Grapes
( The haiku are from Jack’s forthcoming book,
WIDE ROAD TO THE EDGE OF THE WORLD:
301 haiku.)
*
Hearing Mom and Dad
fighting in the bedroom room.
Outside, the red moon.
*
I lost who I was.
Then I found who I would be.
Only who I was knew.
*
In the safe darkness
of the theatre I find truth:
Annie gets her gun.
*
There’s Charlie Chaplin
running but getting nowhere—
a plan for a life
*
falling in rhythm
to the buzzing of the bees
over something dead
*
Would that I was wise,
not this enlightened monkey
wearing monkey mask
*
They open my chest
and then put my heart on ice
while my brain simmers.
*
To write War and Peace:
In the stationary store
ask for more paper.
*
Poetry kills me.
I can’t face its stern demands,
heart filled with cobwebs.
*
When I’m gone, I’ll sure
miss that dove whose song wakes me,
but will she miss me?
*
Fortune cookie says,
“You will go on long journey.”
Pay check. Leave at once.
*
How to eat this life?
Break the past into pieces,
eat one piece at a time.
*
I love this sharp knife.
How it cuts the red pepper.
Salad filled with blood.
*
My childhood is gone.
I don’t want to go back there.
Too much mystery.
*
Once I was a dog.
No one was afraid of me.
I licked people’s hands.
*
I’m a proud Virgo.
One day I’ll be organized,
surrounded by worms.
*
Some things are too sad
to write about on paper.
My closed mouth writes too.
*
Poems not money
give such meaning to my life.
Sometimes meaning sucks.
*
Shakespeare, bricklayer.
Dante, the wise carpenter.
Me? Corn to chickens.
*
At a loss for words?
Call Jack Grapes, home or office,
day or night, for help.
*
I’ve squandered so much,
and given less than I could,
asleep in the rain.
*
Sit still a minute.
Now, let your heart open wide
and see what falls in.