***ALERT: PLEASE GO TO OUR NEW LOCATION AT http://theseptahaiku.tumblr.com***
every day for the month of january 2008, as part of the
artclash collective’s fun-a-day project, i wrote a haiku about a stranger i saw on the subway. i wanted it to capture the experiences i have each morning - sometimes poignant, sometimes silly, sometimes just irritating or confusing, but always brief, impressionistic, and distinct. we ignore the communion of shared space - convention is to ignore the people traveling with you and i feel i can learn so much from the people i’m near, even if we never share a word.
i’m sharing words. seventeen syllables at a time.
i’m going to see if i can keep this up for the year - maybe not every day, but close to it. thanks for stopping by, and try to pay attention in your own worlds.
he wipes the seat with
great care, despite not having
bathed himself today.
i strain to listen
to him quote Scripture at her
inaccurately.
i wonder if it
isn’t clumsiness to blame,
but frotteurism.
she giggles as he
tries, awkwardly, to lay his
head down on her lap.
i love the annoyed
collective scoff when the car
stops dead underground.
three teenage girls
pass a camera full of prom
pictures back and forth.
an old man wears a
daisy tucked into the band
of his fedora.
she hands her son - who
is in a jaw brace - a stick
of gum to chew on.
he sings to himself,
songs with choruses of, “that’s
how a bitch gets shot!”
“i love reruns of
seinfeld,” she says. four women
screech, “no soup for you!”
now and then i smell
fellow riders’ food, and crave
fried chicken, or ribs.
every boy with a
beard makes me think of my ex.
this means: many boys.
“i don’t know what to
say i believe in,” she says.
“jewish isn’t right.”