I am posting this on the website several days late…

In the past week I wrote four sonnets and three of these series of seven haiku I call hai-nets because they have some of the classic characteristics of sonnets. I was deeply moved on the day I wrote this by receiving a photo from a long time ago with people and animals in it that I had dearly loved. I try not to be logical when I write these hai-nets, so they respond in intuitive, quirky ways to the emotions and memories that were flooding me. Here’s the text:

just picked up
the sticks
my mower blade
has complained of
ten thousand times

so long things
don’t change then one day
first frost first fire
ten thousand fall leaves

the old photo
shows us back
in our late 20s
many changes
back

she was so young
then
skinny dipping
godiva
still lives
eternal

old monk
heron
stalks the pond outlet
watches
as flesh
flows beyond time

hummingbird hovers
wanting these sweet
porch nectars
life’s so short
please drink

all you
I once loved
my love has grown
and still grows
all
is still good
there

7/23/24