Reading Haiku

by Priscilla Long

At 3 A.M.

I eat an artichoke

& kale salad with

goat cheese and red onion.

Then turn to Buson.

His winter lamplight

yellows my page.

Indigo Dawn

At the kitchen table

I read Natalie Goldberg

reading Buson. Geese fly over,

honking, honking.       +

At Zoka’s Coffeehouse

Oak tables, sun slant

on the wood boards

of the old floor. I read

Bashō, bask

in his long shadow.

Reading Bashō

New Year’s Eve.

Outside, ice and snow.

A fire in the fireplace.

The annual crossing

paved with poems.

Four poems from the manuscript, Postcards to Posterity (previously unpublished). See the author’s website.