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Here, under the same
night sky, the depths of terror
and the heights of joy.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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It says here your card’s
been declined because you have
insufficient fun.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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With but a few brief
gestures, the boy can change owls
into butterflies.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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Naked, the fog hangs
its obfuscating laundry
on broken branches.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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The only trouble
with taking the edge off is
what to do with it.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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The expert thinks he’s
an expert. The amateur
thinks he’s an expert.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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Don’t believe the hype:
confidence and competence
are complete strangers.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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Would that I could live
somewhere I saw only in
the early evenings.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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First lesson of the
wolf: Love your family. They
are your family.
Second lesson of
the wolf: Take care of those in
your trust. They trust you.
Third lesson of the
wolf: Never give up. The moon
rises and descends.
Fourth lesson of the
wolf: Never stop playing. This
is how to stay wild.
🍁 four Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
inspired by Elli H Radinger
why-am-i-wet reblogged
How funny would it
be if what we fear most ends
up what sets us free.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
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Thirteen Ways of Looking at Dogs
🍁 a set of 13 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
I
If man and dog each
think themself the master, does
it matter who’s right?
II
All the names they called
me. But my dog always came
running just the same.
III
The closest sound to
a human cry is a dog
barking in the night.
IV
Pepper’s ghost is an
elaborate illusion.
But so is Pepper.
V
Irredeemable
despot, puppies soften the
eyes of even you!
VI
No dog would have a
god, which is just why no god
would not have a dog.
VII
Where on those mean streets
for untold years did she learn
such gentle nuzzles?
VIII
The very first time
I caught my father weeping
was when our dog died.
IX
Part of the soul of
master or mistress only
a dog can perceive.
X
Should we not in some
ways envy the paw’s lack of
opposable thumb?
XI
As the last sun sets
on barking men, their dogs shall
have the final say.
XII
Sweet Laika, at least
they kissed your dear nose before
that capsule hatch closed.
XIII
The boy and his dog
forge a simple agreement:
No growls. Just snuggles.
why-am-i-wet reblogged
The prince helps the sad
bear. Then, its appetite back,
the bear eats the prince.
🍁 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
from an extemporaneous bedtime story by @why-am-i-wet
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🍁 Just published
featuring Red Leaf Haiku #4001—#4500 from 2018 and early 2019
why-am-i-wet reblogged
Forty-Five Ways of Looking in a Dream
🍁 a set of 45 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
I
Once the dream begins,
you have nothing but what you
brought in your pockets.
II
Swallowing. Wanting.
Looking down. Running. Wincing.
Burning up. Flying.
III
So be it, you sweet
lovely beast, hidden and hewn
on rough London streets.
[composed in a dream]
IV
Clever nightmares, you
have to fill the very air
yet fit in cradles.
V
Vertical trains may
be caught only by those in
the horizontal.
VI
Dreaming? Look closely
at the text to make sure it’s
not lorem ipsum.
VII
Needle, drop inside
my invisible grooves and
spin me till morning.
VIII
You may turn the dream’s
pages, although the whole dream
is on every page.
IX
Mind flutters seep through
both eyes as dread and yearning
roil in syzygy.
X
Think fast and take notes
in sharp pen, for the dream will
make less and less sense.
XI
Where does the river
do its dreaming? Why, in the
riverbed, of course.
XII
Beware the woman
who lives on a street that runs
all the way through town.
[from a nightmare]
XIII
The back of the house
becomes the front, its garden
now an empty grave.
[from a bad dream]
XIV
Once his wife betrays
him in a dream, he feels glad
not to have married.
XV
Do you know that time
slips out while you’re sleeping? It
falls right out of bed.
[composed in a dream]
XVI
The only parts of
the dream that matter are the
ones memory says.
XVII
The first clue that I’m
having a nightmare is my
father’s quick reply.
[from a nightmare]
XVIII
When deciphering
the dream, look for whose face is
always turned away.
XIX
Breaking off at the
filter, my cigarette shoots
straight up in the air.
[from a bad dream]
XX
Through the raining night
I stumble, setting fire to
trees along the way.
[from a bad dream]
XXI
The dreams get stranger
and stronger until they are
no longer the dreams.
XXII
Terrible fountain,
perpetuating behind
flickering eyelids.
XXIII
O nightmare, trying
to break or corral you is
one hell of a ride!
XXIV
I suppose they’re not
scared of me because I’m no
longer scared of them.
XXV
Dreams are what’s left when
time and space are subtracted
from comprehension.
XXVI
Upon turning the
radio knob, we don’t think,
“This must be a dream!”
XXVII
Black sand mixes with
white in my glass vessel as
she pours in more black.
[from a dream]
XXVIII
There’s another girl.
She may be the one for me.
I really hope so.
[sung in a dream]
XXIX
And never forget
to drape the blues over you
as if they were sky.
[what Kahjeegi told me in a dream]
XXX
This embrace will keep
going on as long as it’s
telling a story.
[told to me in a dream]
XXXI
And how do you say
your name? ask I afterwards.
But she just hangs up.
[from a dream]
XXXII
The past is a dream
like any other, except
it has more dreamers.
XXXIII
Does the long answer
differ from the short? Tonight’s
nightmares need to know!
XXXIV
Through rows of black corn,
dead elephants steer acid
tusks from dream to dream.
[from a nightmare]
XXXV
Doorbells rarely work
in dreams, and deadbolts only
from the other side.
XXXVI
Awake, breathing pairs
with the river. Asleep, it
pairs with the ocean.
XXXVII
Here and there float dreams
that have nothing to do with
their dreamers at all.
XXXVIII
Fast asleep atop
a bullet train whisking right
through Siberia.
[from a dream]
XXXIX
He thinks he’s getting
bigger, but it’s simply his
bed getting smaller.
XL
Mr. Xiao’s tiny
dreams dismantle into a
lost cacophony.
[from the title of a book in a dream]
XLI
What’s left of a dream
is less than the dust caught in
an astronaut’s boots.
XLII
Stop, too, to smell those
flowers that grow beneath not
the sun but the moon.
XLIII
A mind has many
more rooms than windows, and yet
doors unlimited.
XLIV
Precious bird, those bars
are wide enough, and have been
all along. Fly out!
XLV
Where were you last night?
she asks. How, he replies, could
I possibly know?
why-am-i-wet reblogged
Forty-Two Ways of Looking at the End of the World
🍁 a set of 42 Red Leaf Haiku by © John Clark Helzer
I
There is one tower.
Each side takes turns trying to
burn it to the ground.
II
Your beguiling smile
will prove handy when social
order collapses.
III
As these shadows grow
longer, they enjoy falsely
implying more light.
IV
Encapsulated
soul, what shall happen once the
sky passes through you?
V
Climbing out her well
to shame mankind, truth wields a
dank and ratty broom.
VI
Perhaps it’s because
God’s eyes are tired that the world
has switched to dark mode.
VII
Bless you, endangered
tiger. We’ll see you again
on the way back down.
VIII
It’s getting hotter,
and colder, yet there is not
a canceling out.
IX
Vandalizing the
warning buoys will not slow
down the tidal wave.
X
Antibiotics
and electricity are
great, but at what price?
XI
Grief for the future
becomes grief for the past. Joy
floats outside of time.
XII
Some feel writing the
peace treaty in emoji
will backfire later.
XIII
Perfect strangers can
put you on the internet
within ten seconds.
XIV
It’s sometimes true that
things always work out for the
best in the long run.
XV
Refracting in each
distinct glint of sunlight is
a vague fleck of doom.
XVI
Inevitable
failure to control breeds that
impulse to destroy.
XVII
The computer is
wrong. Hopefully an error
instead of a lie.
XVIII
Here’s to some bits of
amusement before the Earth
is consumed by grey goo.
XIX
In the end, all the
reveries reduce to a
lone string without wave.
XX
What is the best way
to play a cassette tape that’s
missing those two holes?
XXI
The art of turning
out the lights before it’s too
dark to find the switch.
XXII
When land and sea have
had enough, fire and water
shall again be one.
XXIII
It would have been in
poor taste to call it Civil
War One from the start.
XXIV
One hundred years of
fighting ends in a kiss. One
last death among lips.
XXV
As the museum
burns, both those long dead and those
not yet born weep most.
XXVI
What poetry did
Valentina see from up
there that men had not?
XXVII
Freshly jettisoned
from some doomed craft, the escape
module signs ions.
XXVIII
When rhinos want to
party hard, nothing beats some
powdered human nose.
XXIX
He drives off before
I can finish warning of
hyperinflation.
XXX
Everything ever
has already happened. And
will happen again.
XXXI
Here come the sundogs,
who shall track the sun until
all molecules stop.
XXXII
Inside the shopping
mall wander few people through
even fewer stores.
XXXIII
Contrail cascades light
up the sky once translation
has been cast aside.
XXXIV
With great sorrow and
bittersweet reminiscence,
I wave to China.
XXXV
Hurry up please it’s
time. Hurry up please it’s time.
The wasteland is nigh.
XXXVI
The only time I’ve
heard God is when my son cupped
my ear in his hand.
XXXVII
Based on which song the
radio next plays, the world
could go either way.
XXXVIII
Men prefer she wear
skirts, with no belt from which their
heads could one day hang.
XXXIX
Look at this menu:
it has everything on it!
Even you and me.
XL
Done with their grilled cheese
sandwiches, the aliens
destroy our planet.
XLI
The end museum
has but one painting, though it
hangs in all the rooms.
XLII
And the seas rose, and
the forests smoked, and the last
humans watched reruns.
why-am-i-wet reblogged