I've been going through a poetry-drought for nearly a year now. The muse seems to be silent. But today I worked at it a little bit. Although I depend mostly on inspiration and mystical bursts of literary beauty to write my poetry, truly good poetry takes hard work--work that I, too often, don't have the discipline to give it. But today I worked at it through the simple form of haiku. Of course, haiku being a Japanese form, some of the rules change or are lost when using it as an English device. I appreciated working with the form, though, because the tightness of the structure gives the poems the poignancy of a "literary snapshot," encapsulating no more than a feeling, an image, or a single thought. Anyway, here are a few miscellaneous haiku I wrote today, in an effort to get back to writing poetry:
In the rain, again
I stand amid falling hopes
And pray for refuge
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O Thou tragic Christ--
Descending, crimson in death
Rent by wood and nails
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She smiles like sunshine
Through a dim, plate-glass window
On a dreary day
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God made grackles, too
I remind myself of that
When they mob my tree
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Pause yourself, silent...
Listen, listen achingly
To the still, small voice