Common Law

Experience,
Constantly applied,
Results in lessons
True and tried.

Rugrat

The toddler's eyes
Proclaim "I am 2"
"There is nothing
You can do,
No escape,
Until I'm through.

紅葉

A season passing, in the life of a tree,
Is displayed in orange, red, and gold,
Colors announcing change, quietly...

Our last Glimpse

It happened quickly,
They descended
Quietly from the sky,
And everything ended...

Missed Opportunity

A nugget of happiness,
Was waiting right there,
But you walked right
By it, totally unaware,

Small comfort not
Knowing what you lose,
Based on the direction
Of attention you choose...

Impermanence

Words, are sounds attempting to
Capture pieces of the fleeting,
The flowing we cannot hold,
Passing by, but never meeting,
Ideas and impressions paused,
But gone before completing...

Digestive Gas

The ladies' book club meeting
Ended before it really started
When the proper hostess
Lost control and farted...

It's Just Another Day

Gifts of conscious comfort
Days and nights will send,
Moments of relaxation
And joyous boredom blend,
Into something approaching
Happiness, in the end...

Conscious Of It All

The realization that summer
Has disappeared too soon,
Hits me hard, as I count the
Lost days, under a harvest moon

白虎隊

16 years old, white band wrapped on my head,
Fighting for the Shogun in the Aizu hills,
Eventually defeated, we choose to be dead...

Morning Coffee Shot

Part of it is psychological,
Part of it is mythological,
But the real power of the bean,
Resides in smell, and caffeine...

Dark Side Of Bushido 武士道の無

A samurai slashes a random
Vagrant, in Shinagawa Ward,
On the Tokaido Road, in order
To test the sharpness of his sword...

Displaced In Croatia

Somewhere, in what used to be Syria,
Some people who could take no more
Of the chaos, hate, and pain, paid cash
To strangers to escape from the war,
By sailing across a sea, in leaky boats,
All hoping to reach a distant safer shore,
The people cast their fate on the kindness
Of Europeans, they'd never met before...

The result is confusion, and a shamble,
People from what used to be Syria,
Trapped and spinning in their gamble...

Millard Sunrise

My friend, who took this picture of a morning's
Small and quiet wakening, is no longer around,
But yet, I can feel it, I am there at the moment
He looked up at the pastel sky, from the ground...

(Photo by Geoffrey M. Hamilton, 1955-2011)

Socrates

Socrates was an ancient Greek philosopher
Who knew how to reason, parse, and think,
Yet he wasn't politically adept enough
To keep the hemlock out of the drink
He was coerced to finally consume,
By order of those above, afraid of the truth,
His morals and honesty sealed his doom...

Payback

Some push through life, waiting to be
Paid, what they believe they are owed,
But the more likely outcome is that they
Will simply reap what they have sowed...

Echoes

Say hey to the plant
Greetings to the chair
Joking with the
Furniture everywhere
Talk back to the TV
In the rarified air
Of a place with
No one there...

Epiphany On A Mountain

Above the rocks, almost floating,
Are yellow, pink, and mystic green,
Miraculous colors, mixing and
Urging to be felt, vice seen...

Primordial Ballgame

I follow sports because
The drama on the field
Releases emotions,
Otherwise concealed,
The joy and the thrill
Of victory summons
Feelings of the kill...

Advice

Too hard to deal
With, let it pass,
Before you feel...