April Tanka

April 1
Rain and sleeplessness
Open April in quiet
Workings on the soul,
As dim and industrious
As all the Fools of the day.

April 2
A dark carousel
Spins and mixes the moonlight
With unwelcome thought,
Making one foolhardy ride
To take place on one’s pillow.

April 3
A downy pillow
With no weight and no bottom
Accepts the sunken,
Like the waters of the deep:
Sweet Nyquil's buried treasure.

April 4
2007
Can inflict in flashes still
Reminders of loss
In reviewing its remains:
Even its old tax return.

April 5
The silver maple
Outside the window opens
Buds at spring's calling;
Yet inside, throats grow raspy
And can call no one clearly.

April 6
This morning's commute
Was a blur of cloud and trance,
All cold senses dulled
To the sky's warring clashes
And the vigilance of earth.

April 7
Freighted with baskets,
With hellos, and with constraints,
We sweep past check-in
To the whirlwind final hour
Before Coronation court.

April 8
This morning I find
They fixed last night's crisis then
And didn't leave it
For me to amend, for once.
Sharing a burden, I rest.

April 9
A pink tennis ball
Bounces with plawhplawhplawh sounds
On the concrete floor
From hand to quick-lunging hand:
Hard to believe it's practice.

April 10
Tranquil wandering
Paired with furious onslaught
Without harm's real risk
In a small and facile world:
How dreamy. It must be WoW.

April 11
Another reign change
Come and gone in a small world;
Meanwhile friends share more
Of their hearts' fond convictions,
Making their own history.

April 12
Words may give color
Or clarity to wisdom,
Yet impression's paint
Is so often colored true
That it defines boundaries.

April 13
Every so often
You, unknowing, remind me
That you're simply right
For me in who you are and
What you do: so, dear, thank you.

April 14
Midsummer drums and
Another fire's tempting view.
Why would I look for
Another "something new" when
I've got you to let me down?

April 15
This fog rolling flat
Against the earth, cold on cold,
Comes to each season
With either longing for spring,
Or for memory of last night.

April 16
Whan tendre maydes
The hooly blisful martir
For right to seke,
They forseke licour that
Hem hath holpen al the nyght.

April 17
Wind and rain and wave
Turn the earth and its airs
And fools' paradise,
The shifts hiding from humans
Their own soft and timeless selves.

April 18
Golden is the sun
And its glow on earthly shapes;
This invitation
Comes from the season to all:
It is warm—open and shine.

April 19
The hawk’s yellow stare
(Hailed as sight-through-all-facades
In mythology)
Could be the fascination
Of a small, baffled bird brain.

April 20
Lynx, from the Greek word
For “shine”, holds close his secrets
In the dark, lore says.
How would we know? I suppose
He must confide in someone.

April 21
How can Miss Dreadful
Weigh a rotund fourteen pounds?
She was eleven.
No, her belly isn't big:
Her head's just getting smaller.

April 22
Caitlin's butterflies
Sit fanning their colored wings
In her poetry,
Awaiting the warmer spring
To take wild flight from the page.

April 23
Weary of the work
Of making rain, the clouds list
Toward the eastern sea,
Retiring into summer,
Gray only with disinterest.

April 24
It's someone's birthday
nom nom nom nom nom nom nom
I would honor him
With Alice's Restaurant
Played loud, but it's in storage.

April 25
Happy birthday to
Old AWOL McAbsentpants,
Wishing you the best
And all, wherever you are.
Love, "Alty McAltypants"

April 26
The root of this sloth
Is the sudden summer strike
And we're living things
Waiting full of energy,
Then knocked over by the heat.

April 27
The expanding sun
Throws coronal flares and winds
In all directions;
Neither can I be confined
To a chair and desk today.

April 28
Miniscule grass seeds,
More delicate than fennel,
Season the plain earth
In our hope; and in their hope,
Poor weeds secure their roots first.

April 29
Spring courts, an event
To run, summer’s new teaching,
Fall’s language studies:
Well in advance of the spring,
I was overgrown with plans.

April 30
Just like that, this rain
Of April's water and words
In five metered lines
Evaporates in a mist
Of clouds and forgetfulness.