Fast Food Haiku

Wok and Roll
Friday night's exhaust
Yakatori or sockitumi?

Keeping Them Crossed

I keep my fingers crossed

Hope for the best

Indulge in expectation, again

Thinking that knocking on wood

Will protect us all

Or that the proper placement of objects

Will bring about what I am

Always working towards

I send wishes to the stars

And trust that the

Cosmic arrangement of things

Out in cold, dark, and

Unconscious space

Will guide my small dreams

Into orbit around a glowing globe

Somewhere

My intentions are directed

Toward a future I'm hoping

Is beyond the reach of this past

Filled, as it is, with

Cracks beneath my slow-witted feet

Mirrors broken by accident

Hats thrown casually on beds

And a lot of ladders

Mid-life Crisis

Oh, my God!

My hair!

My waistline!

My bank account!

And, death, too!

Checking It Twice

Let’s make a list of the
powerful words
the evocative ones
the ones that will
bring forth love
from the cruelest heart
and replace the weeds
with flowers

that will turn the moon full
that will cast long shadows
that will inspire birdsong
that will ignite the flames
that will melt the ice
set the table
keep the pages turning

that will breathe honey
that will create a breeze
that will still chaos
that will cross bridges at twilight
improve tans
straighten desks
and build strong bodies 12 ways

Words that will saw a woman in half
pull a rabbit out of the hat
push worry to one side
unseal fate
instill confidence
and bind together all wounds

Words that coast downhill and
incite perpetual motion
that carry the tune
take the weight off
induce laughter

Words that bring about reconciliation
accomplish big deeds
that fire the imagination
that initiate long years of prosperity
and cause dreams to arise
like fish to the surface

Words that compel the impossible
install, nearby, the unreachable
and allow the inevitable

Words that
share the wealth
save the whales
and give peace a chance

Words
more powerful than despair
words that evoke the once hoped-for
and now forgotten

These words are a way to
define a wish
to tell the future
to make hope real

a way to imagine
a way to begin


- Ted Ringer

4/5/09

First, we take a little step
And then we take another
We started somewhere way back there
And now we're here, oh brother!

Two Thousand Nine, April fifth
It sounds like science fiction
We're walking on this road of life
Let's do it with conviction

Those little steps accumulate
And take us quite a distance
Along the way, we sometimes fight
But we bow to Time's insistence

There is no other way we find
And no other way is better
We stick our toe into the lake
And each day just get wetter

Finally, we're in the swim
Contentedly, we're floating
Each drop contains a universe
Each drop deserves our noting

- Ted Ringer



Way, way back.



At least the robbers
left this one thing behind -
moon in my window

- Ryokan

Jazz

Hello Poets, writers or not, today is the day.


Jazz

His hands, like alligators, are eating up the keys
And he’s there, facing the music, jumping up a little on the bench
To pull the notes out of that battered old box,
Running up the keyboard to hit the one note that gets you,
Left hand laying down the beat for the trumpet to soar over.
We’re pinned to our chairs and know there is nothing else to do
Except, take it in.

The trumpet now is overstated, but no matter, the moment will pass
And another will come to take its place and then it will be now again.
Always now, moving to the next bar, the next inspiration,
One note coming out of the one before it, without thought,
All made from feeling, rising to drive us crazy.

- Ted Ringer



And, oh, the past.



Canis Major

The great Overdog.
That heavenly beast
With a star in one eye,
Gives a leap in the east.

He dances upright
All the way to the west
And never once drops
On his forefeet to rest.

I'm a poor underdog,
But tonight I will bark
With the great Overdog
That romps through the dark.

- Robert Frost