girls' wear mannequin -
its hand-sewn sequin heart
speaks of sweatshops

-Jeronimus

In the courtyard 
of the temple of the sky
blooms a flower.

- Jeronimus, after Kabir

All that remains of
the infinite sea of night
are these words of ink


Jeronimus (inspired by a haiku by Jorge Luis Borges)

Rescued from the ferns
the grey watering can will rain
for the vanished clouds

-Jeronimus

The evening sky
is an old master painting
of a blue-ware bowl
-Jeronimus

Like gold, this blue runs
molten in the crucible 
of the summer sky
-Jeronimus

Like Isis' sistrum
cicadas' summer shimmer
exorcises thought
-Jeronimus

Kookaburras call
in jungles they've never seen,
thanks to Hollywood.

-Jeronimus

A cool conflagration 
roaring in the high canopy.
I melt in summer's forge.

-Jeronimus

Evening

In the night that comes,
these trees will still be green,
this sky still blue.
-Jeronimus

Cypress pines - brushes
dipped in the infinite ink
of marine winds

-Jeronimus

on the warming lawn
various grasses compete
like warring kingdoms


-Jeronimus

Plumes upon the green Earth's helm
bending in the still chill wind.
-Poplars by the roadside.

-Jeronimus
('upon' is archaic but it sounds well with plume and poplar)

Spring-summer

On the boundary
a hedge sends errant tendrils
toward the summer


-Jeronimus

Immortality

high fine clouds like phoenix plumes
- a sickle moon scythes past lives
In afternoon blue

-Jeronimus

Who is the Poet?

No subject comes to mind -
the whole vibrating world's a poem
with sun and moon for metre.

Blue and Gray

Weeks of gray skies
brushed away by a cold blue wind.
New slates cover blue sarking.
-Jeronimus

Early Winter

a single shining sound
in the darkness before dawn,
- the rain-quickened stream

-Jeronimus

Perfuming the mind with depth
the wind from the sea
brings bursts of rain.

-Jeronimus

Purusha

The sound of distant thunder -
Personhood expands to fill all space.
Sudden, brilliant, as the lightning bolt.

-Jeronimus

All night, drop by drop,
the owl's incessant question.
The mind overflows with it.

-Jeronimus

Like the shimmering sound of
shell beaches sifted by summer waves
- a sea breeze in the leaves.

-Jeronimus

A reverse universe:
blue clouds in a white sky -
jacaranda trees, overcast day

-Jeronimus

The jacaranda is a tree with blue to purple-blue blossoms, native to Central and South America.

A great river flows,
irrigating the senses
through a few simple lines.

-Jeronimus

thriving in deep shade,
cliveas make their own suns
of bright, warm orange

-Jeronimus

green like copper domes,
tenacious to the hot-plate slate -
lichen on the summer roof

-Jeronimus

Formlessness

Don't look for images in clouds -
Not even the faces of the gods.
Their glory lies in formlessness

-Jeronimus

Winter Almost Over

Spring in the step of shoppers.
Cloud cows browse the blue above.
Many forms, one purity.

-Jeronimus

Fujitaka

Inishie mo
Ima mo kawaranu
Yo no naka ni
Kokoro no tane wo
Nokosu koto no ha

In this world that remains,
Past and present
Unchanged,
I leave these words:
Seeds of my spirit.

-Fujitaka
Upon receiving this poem, Emperor Goyozei ordered an end to the siege of the castle
in which Fujitaka expected to be killed.
The pen was proved mightier than the sword.
This is not a haiku.

As I dried my sleeves,
drenched with chrysanthemum dew,
did an age slip by?


Jeronimus, after the ancient Japanese poet Sosei Hoshi

1)
a moment,
the waves show
the water beneath

2)
ah!
the butterflies'
shadow

3)
sleeping
after graduation -
dreams of cotton in the wind

4)
opening the door
to sweep the dirt out -
heavy summer rain

-Bhalachandra

Hydrangeas

A recent painting, acrylic on canvas, 12 x 12 inches.

.

Blue clouds, brains of rain,

'vessels of water', in Greek.

What angel arranged hydrangeas?

- Jeronimus

Pine trunks creak in the breeze,
as if an old chest had closed
- winter afternoon

-Jeronimus

Clouds on the horizon
bleached by marine distance -
as old as driftwood

-Jeronimus

no more
questioning
-birds singing on
every tree

-Bhalachandra

To the vain, it's grey.
To a weeder, it's green
- time has many hues.

-Jeronimus

After rising
I wash my eyes in the sky
-a blue ablution

-Jeronimus

No stone can shatter,
no dust can gather on
the mirror of the lake

Jeronimus (after Thoreau)

After days of rain
no other reality
exists but green

-Jeronimus

The Sport

White camellia -
its inner child has spattered
one petal with red

- Jeromimus
Note: A 'sport' is a flower that has an unusual colour variation.