Thumb Rules

I learned recently how to measure the length of a lei,

officially, circle-length of Aloha, which is

akin to the foot length of the forearm-

between the wrist and elbow-

you find a number true to you and I

By 

some magic formulae.

I studied the man taking long counting strides,

his lips moving,

as he measured the distance

between us

as if following a treasure map

leading to nothing.

At the last minute meeting,

the Scottish Architect wanted to know 

how many trees must go?

And he asked about the slope situation 

and the root removal.

Half the canopy distance wise-safer than sorry. 

And the roots must remain

for erosion control.

This was no rule of thumb but

the architect squinted and 

reconsidered his angle.

As it was above,

so it was below.

With the measurements being equal,

the length of walking away,

by the width of a tree,

the gold coins were spread

lavishly.

Image: Il Tratto di Scientia d'Arme (Camillo Agrippa), 1553 (Second guard of Camillo Agrippa in his 1553 treatise) in Public Domain.

City folk

Someone said,
the full moon looks larger in the city
because of skyscrapers-
which said nothing
about people feeling smaller,
more condensed when clustered.

Tall shadows do distort our perception of time,
such as dusk does bend warm light
in the redwood grove.

Somehow,
the moon still washes over and spills into all
narrow alleys and dives deep into dark
watering holes
with its aloof blue glow,
at some points
her own dead valleys visible
from under the canopy of cemented jungles
patching the land up.
The beacon looms over
with tiny towers babbling in slang.

Concrete was not so.

We stand closest together is
where we feel the smallest.

Somehow it seems

we will never be safe from these lights. 




Painting by August Splitgerber (1844–1918) (http://www.neumeister.com/) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Golden hour

Bathed in sepia lamplight,
the skin tingled,
the spirit sighed in its sheath,
all was glimmering and gilded,
and the branched bars became
too much to bear,
when stacked so high.

Under their long skeleton boughs,
shadows shrunk and lost
their cool blue,
leaving exposed all the sheltered bodies
that dissipate through the hours, only dissolving
in the company of leaves,

until all gathered-close
in purple pools of night,
fanged beasts,
like dead languages,
creep out through the white pages,
now folded, and saved. A place
keep our warmth inside.



Painting by John Atkinson Grimshaw [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Our Age has a certain ring to it

Your age is present-

ly showing. As we read the lines etched on your face,

Together, the watch wears a mask on your wrist

with an arrow of fate counting on you.

Anatomical karma

chimes in-time for more (chloro)phyll

istine alkaline intake.

It is high time

that the phylogenetic tree be pruned back-

wards, like a dying star, making space

anthrop(omorph)ic

by its fingerprint rings, and sings itself historically

metaphorically

birefringent.

And yes, we’ve known about all the ages for-ages

and have own our roots deep down,

fracking about, stacking our (una)wares,

and we keep coming back to the source,

of course, to the fruits and the

light between.

You’ve read it all, carved (t)here on wood,

a sign of the times in a nut (shell).

Whispered i was here (this year)

whittling a Lilliputian ring on its fingered

keepsake trunk.

Painting by Félix Resurrección Hidalgo [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Implement(ation) (misc. Haiku from Journal v.3, 2016)

Self identifies
by letters strung together
make names from scratch(es).
                 //

Write with felt marker
in the morning; it will be
pencil by nightfall.
________________________________

Butterfly and moth

are one chrysalis away

by color of death.

    ±             

Naiveté is

a bumble bee whose life

is heavy with lust.

☼     

Territory, as 

a place you feel most at home

outside of yourself.

                  ♦ 

Enough already

the tallest trees drink slowly

take in the new air...

         ↑

Photograph By ZachT (Own work) Bernese Alps in [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Looking up (Haiku)

I had known flowers

intimately before now

noticing the trees

Painting by Bertha Wegmann [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Synthesis

Two saplings sprang up
simultaneously
on the top of the Eagles Eye ridge line

Each grew taller from the others gentle support
alee with privacy shade,
goading each other on
lush in envy green

It did not take long before you could see
distinct personalities budding
from these two trees
with respect for the space they shared
not thier roots, but in between
branches as arms with finger
leaves and sparsely
touching

By now, from far away some say
even today-you can see how they've grown
apart
reaching for different light.


Image by Asher Brown Durand, Nature Study Trees Newburgh, New York, 1849 [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.