September Haikus

by Keith Phelps

How fitting is it
That sandhill cranes call
To the fertile south

That grapes disorder
Themselves with their daughter wasps
As colors bruise forth

Fitting that soon we will hear
Whispers of old gears halting
Bringing the truths of

Tracks laid down in snow
The different routes made
In only one direction

I long to translate
The words gurgling in
Your sabotaged talk

Even your eyes cease
To tell of signs and wonders
As your breath recedes

Ebbing out cold like
The tides you patrolled in life
To throw back beached whales

Soon your vessel will
Lay plastic like the moments
We came to forget

Soon I will wander
A broken home full of ghosts
All cloaked in their wars

Soon you will come to
Others as insects and rain
And the Ash burning