Global Haiku • Fall 2020
Dr. Randy Brooks

Porch Door Swinging

by
Mara Currens

dedicated to my Mama

While short and inconsequential to some, students of haiku can find an entire human being in just three lines. Because the poem is so brief, the poet has to instill as much life and intention as they can into their writing. It is a sort of meditation, a healing of a mind torn in so many disparate directions in the outside world. It is a break from the self-deprecation and the cynicism that we inflict on ourselves, rather, it gently inspires us to look within--to find joy in every little thing. To revel in a world unseen and crash into life with vigor, the porch door swinging behind you.

patient poem . . .
how morning fog
clings to the grass

crow on a wire fence
tilts his head at me
and laughs

bleeding heart

a bow's curve
painting the weathered marina
eros laughed

crow circles
pastel sky
broad brush strokes

return home
the smell
I used to wear

city bus, 4:36 pm
hijabi woman
turns toward the southeast

she kisses him
I
turn the radio up

Mount Everest
at the end
of my cul-de-sac

grandma favorite mug
behind the hydrangeas
     and the daies
          and the rosebush

art fair
in front of her portrait
grass worn down

Grey Lady

she shivers in the cold
weight
like his arm around her shoulders

university library
ghosts litter the shelves

her spirit
drafts in old halls
the way to her resting place

coffee cup staining
forgotten manuscript
crop circles

icicles drip from
evergreen eyes

dawn's shadow
whispering through the door frame
new moon

Cara Murrens and Gwn Klinkley

pregnancy test
the toilet lid
her pew

Minnesota halloween
fairy wings
over winter coat

her laugh
birds
through a paper shredder

soup made of grass, mud,
flowers from mom's garden
a very small witch

the choke of black earth—
my mother screams
Persephone

concrete spires
a machine invisible
from the inside

she tears off her dress
to feel the rain
porch door swinging