Unnatural Nature

Sakura

“Sakura”

(Haikus)

Japan brought over
Light pink and white budding trees
Spring forever changed

The cherry blossoms
Or the sakura flower
Beauty either way  

Tourist attraction
But money can’t buy the look
Of awe when first seen

Three thousand back then
Three thousand in the present
Oh, how times have changed

Pink clouds up above
Blanket our eyes from the sky
Petals raining

Buried Bodies; Dug up Lives

“Buried Bodies; Dug Up Lives”

(Ballade Poetry; Arlington National Cemetery)

Six feet under
The buried bodies lie
Yet where do their souls go? mourners ponder.
To heaven? To hell?
Above or below, purely dichotomous?
Or, do they remain in the soil
Penetrating the body’s decomposition with life?
Oh, they are one with the Earth!

Soldiers who lived a chunk of their lives
Below the ground
In the pest-infested, mud-laden trenches,
the submarines exploring the inky, mystifying oceans,
the underbrush labyrinths of Vietnam.
Now, wooden caskets envelop the men
A box within the land’s chest
Memories, admirable and traumatic,
Are preserved.
Oh, they are one with the Earth!

Onlookers may think the dead are Cemented
in this cemetery
Bound to coffins and gravestones
Names and dates, etched with a hyphen.
To even try to describe what glory, pain, suffering, triumph
Between those words and numbers is futile,
For their legacy endures.
Oh, they are one with the Earth!

Life remains underneath
Restored and renewed into new forms
From those bravely passed.
Oh, they are one with the Earth!

Caged

“Caged (by the White Line)”

(Track)

Snow pouring, feet pounding, heart racing
That white line
At the end
Blurred
By the flurries
By my vision
Sweat and flakes settle on my lashes
I lunge forward
“1:18!” my loud-voiced short coach bellows
Relief
That this workout is over

Breeze whooshes, feet pounding, heart racing
Propelling me backwards
Cold air pours into my lungs
White line
Gets further
And further
And further
From my sight
“1:22!”

Sun glaring, feet pounding, heart racing
Just 100 meters left my racing shoes whisper
Past that white line
Separating the pain
The fierce competition
The weeks of training
The nerves
From the relaxation
The deep, slow breaths
The Taco Bell I will soon devour
“1:10!”

That white line
A striking contrast to the red
Determines happiness of my personal record
Jealousy of the girl two meters ahead
Failure I couldn’t surpass expectations
Liberation

How can so much raw, natural emotion
Be packed into
Artificial, chalky paint
A single swipe across the track

On this rubber 400-meter loop
I’m caged
“On your mark”
Into a line
“Seeeettttt”
into a circle
“GO!”
into a race

I’m released