Haikutimes.com

welcome to the haikutimes

Issue #80. January 17, 2004. Haikutimes staff celebrates a haiku birthday, with haiku poets coming out of the woodwork to help the literary direction of the evening. Featuring: Amanda Conti, Linda Flinkman, James Frey, Wynn Bruce, David Teitler, Marty Humphreys, Robert Power, Susan Peterson, Sara Benson, Jala Pfaff, Soda Sonoda, Carolyn Bargman, Tom Hopson, Patty Machen, Paige Wild, Tammy and Patrick Lynn, Dublin and Scout (Susan's dogs), Puck (Tammy's cat), and Jonathan Machen.




only in base ten
does this whole demarcation of 40
make any sense

sales lady comments
looks nice with your hair
in the makeup aisle

warm sun melting snow
wet january gully
snowpack in trouble




only base ten
gives forty significance
abstract milestone

from my perspective
glad to have lived through twenty
now that i'm forty

twenty-year angst
now given hardly a thought
from wise old forty




dry evergreen limb
reclaimed by some wolly green moss
north side of the lake

giggles and laughter
from chatting lakeside couple
i sketch quietly

alaskan cousin
reports it's twenty below
on birthday phone call




sinking into both
journey and destination
no mid-life crisis

jon on his fun bike
looks like a little wind up
metal circus toy

out on his fun bike
toodling around
like a circus clown




once when we were young
the world at our fingertips
i'm glad it still is!

melt into forty
she's there - radiant and juicy love
to greet her man home




he plans our demise
by wild dogs and cold winds
but we still love him!

we like to greet him
with dog enthusiasm
while he feigns disgust




he loves us, he loves
us not. he loves us, he loves
us not. he loves us.

he's turning forty
but since jonathan met paige
he seems much younger!




approaches the edge
flutters, sweats? joyfully jumps
sweetest fall of all

hey tinge 'o spudkins
we were born in sixty-four
lead the way, elder




only doors away
jon seems more like a housemate
want to go to dots?

as i contemplate
jonathan soon to be wed
will attention wane?




vast talent
squeezed into
tiny trailer

chicken bones
left boiling on stove
lingering stench




consciously persues
his forty-year-old wisdom
bringing him to me

slushy winter streets
recombinant bicycle
could use some mudflaps




i plan to be there
celebrating your birthday
i'm glad you're alive

twinkle in his eye
serious jonesin' for haiku
and a happy heart




sketchpad, camera, pen
biking the white rim canyon
jon, artist on wheels

hogger of the womb
even so, a long, great friendship
with my dumb brother




jonathan used to
live with michael way back when
they ate boy food lots

with shit-eating grin
jo, on the slopes with free pass!
forty? or fourteen?




pooh! poetic muse
states mandatory furlough
on sabbatical

you're in my bathroom
wondrous sight of mountain snow
jonathan, thank you




bother! no haiku
forgot i am japanese
let jonathan do

neighbor friend
sunshine wakes me from a nap
and draws me outside,
over to jonathan's
to see does he want to hack
maybe share a pot 'o tea
afterwards




there should be some significance
to our numerical system,
base ten and all those digits
that cause us to link the number 40
to some sort of rite of passage.

I shoulda asked sam bush
when he was up there bashing on the mandolin
and firing up the fiddle on new years
if he gave a second thought to his age
once he and the audience
began howling at the moon together.




we need rituals
and rites of passage
even in this modern era, even
when some folks are saying
sixty is the new forty.
well, i have twenty years then
as long as i'm currently stuck on forty
until the next time i have to step aside
and make a point to look
at the actual passage of time
and what sort of state
my physical and emotional body are in.

it's like a line drawn in the sand -
one one side you can look down
the years of trying this approach
and that approach,
the time spent figuring it all out,
and in the other direction you see
your self going forward
without any of that mental rifraff.





solo/group kukai
drawing/writing/photography
jonathan machen