The Photo
From Gotenba Japan
The hill is steep in your picture;
the trees are not totally straight;
they are slightly tilted by gravity.
The depth of ground is not there,
covered thick with pale leaves;
it is smothered by overgrowth.
The far, sparse and brittle light is
carved into a forest that is not
there; pieces of sharpened sky.
With no one inside the thicket;
something shadowy whispers
angled epistles to wet tree roots
Notes:
(c)R.H.Peat 12/8/98 -- 1:30 am
Free verse--4 tercets/ 12 lines
A letter from one poet to another
From a photo given to me by Rinzo Shimizu
Of the area around Gotenba Japan
A NOT poem
When Mud Dreams
Our thick reflections flow out -
Sap beneath the bark of oaks
In Gotemba-a snapshot taken-
Wooded sky clenched in your fist
You ask me about the roots
Of the forest you have sent me
In Auburn- the wheelbarrow
Pushed-dirt on my cold hands
I tell you all about the wet leaves
Covering my earthly home.
Ink twigs scratch on the clouds
Messages written on puddled sky
Notes:
To a poet from a friend
(c)R. H. Peat -- 12/29/98 -- 9:32 PM
Free verse/ 6 couplets/ 12 lines
From a letter to Rinzo In Japan
A Ball Made By The Forest
I take a photo.
Trees in the Gotenba forest.
The globe flows in space,
A ball made by the forest flies through the sky.
(c)Rinzo Shimizu --Dec 1998--
Your Forest As The Song
We begin in the woods
shadow steps a-dance
the leaves cutting silhouettes
into a rooted distant sky.
We end inside the night
dark heavens a-flutter
the trees whispering wind over
three stars in Orion laughing
(c)R.H.Peat -- 1/7/99 -- 9:03 PM
Free Verse/ 2 quatrains/ 8 lines
The Roots Of Hair
The stars melt away
in the twilight.
The silhouettes of the forest fade away
in the violet sky.
I see the roots of hair as many cracks in the sky.
(c)Rinzo Shimizu --Jan 1999--
A Tanka/Thin sky
Amazed in bare woods,
stern wind captured in branches,
I listen-thin sky.
Assault in winter shadows,
I feel pricked coldness.
(c)R. H. Peat - 1/13/98 -12:13 am
Attemp at English Tanka/ 5 lines
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