Haiku

Published in The Heron’s Nest, 2016:

on days like this
he used to feed apples to deer…
rust on our shared fence

Published in Akitsu Quarterly, 2017:

icehouse tryst—
reindeer snouts
rooting through the snow

torn rotator cuff
gripping the stag’s antlers
while his son slits its throat

crevice in a shrimp’s head
where the tastiest meat is—
Christmas Day

car-top canoe:
banana leaf garnish
on a mung bean cake

Published in the Asahi Shimbun, 2019:

immigrant parents
yellow acorns
plunged in snow

what else has changed?
red clematis now blooming
in Dad’s yard

between two floorboards
a curled red leaf
overheard tete-a-tete

a nude girl
wearing elbow-length gloves
tree half-stripped of bark

Published in Acorn, 2019:

I trip, distracted
by the dragonfly
distracted by the lupine

Published in Presence, 2019:

my lover’s
much younger than I tonight—
trampled catkins

Published in the Wales Haiku Journal, 2020:

empty flip-flops
wading
in oyster-colored moonlight

Published in Modern Haiku, 2021:

mumbling Robert Frost’s
calming rhymes…in rhythm with
the MRI’s thuds

Published in Haikuniverse, 2021:

my first winter wed:
no one warned me the cold would
make my ring fall off!

Published in the Mainichi Shimbun, 2022:

thunder cracks—
in the drawer, one spoon
clinks against another

tilting my face skyward
to curb morning sickness
I see the moon

Placed 2nd in the Filoli Haiku Contest, 2022:

wisteria
weighed down by froth
of too much joy

Published in Frogpond, 2022:

on our beach chairs
we are to this flock of gulls
flyover country

Published in Haikuniverse, 2022:

as an old bruise fades—
chili flakes,
scattered

Published in brass bell: a haiku journal, 2022:

the whole room yells
“unmute yourself” as if
they care what he’s saying

sipping water
before my blood test
whirlpool in my stomach

Edina, Minnesota
my scraped knee skin cells
still mixed with the asphalt

thawing shrimp under the tap
snowmelt drips
down the kitchen window

he gave up his cat
to wed her—now the stars
reproach her like cats’ eyes

dad’s birthday cake
cutting the slices thin
to make them last

years posthumously
his duck decoys
remember his hands

Published in Under the Basho, 2022:

Christmas lights
still up in February:
small mercy in a hard year

an attacking goose
drives an owl into retreat
election day

Published in the Asahi Shimbun, 2022:

pumping breast milk
white droplets writhe free
the late year’s ghosts

Published in World Haiku Review, 2023:

gray-white plumage
puffed with self-importance
guarding the driftwood

Published in Haikuniverse, 2023-24:

pureed peas:
like her bib, my memory tries
to capture everything

rear windshield:
the frost’s drunk texts
fill line after line