Bonus

Grave markers are a sort of sculpture.

Totems borne by believers against death.

They speak of the dead but not for them.

Haibun 2

Black Sheen, Olive Green

Black sheen, olive green cicada flaps.

Floodlight flips on. Crickets pulse out, a thousand miniscule glass stoppers spun in bottle necks.

Cicada buzzes. It's twitching on its back, its wings pummeling the composite decking, its pale underbelly defenseless.

Cicada flips right-side up again, its clear wings still furious.

Man grips hard a stick,
Six feet away from wasp nest
clinging to railing

Haibun

Oxygen Apparatus

Light stays steady through the day's phases, through the night. The rectangular gunmetal door handles show every fingerprint. On the foamboard ceiling, a metal track describes an arc around the bed. A plasticized fabric curtain is suspended therefrom on rings, bunched at one end of the track, near the glistening porcelainesque sink. The woman on the bed, soaked in sweat, grunts and strains. From behind behind a McPainting that a 20 year-old nurse slides aside appears oxygen apparatus: rubber hoses and plastic mask.

The doctor pulls, one
hand on the device, one braced
against stainless steel