Published in Cattails: Premier Edition: January 2014

http://www.unitedhaikuandtankasociety.com/37=134.html

In Darkness and In Light: A Colaboration
Sergio Oritz, Puerto Rico
Sonam Chhoki, Bhutan

I was the sin,
a wild horse galloping
from the horizon—
everything I saw
was spoken into her ear

she was a tightrope
walker, the enduring smell
of a snuffed candle—
facing a certain wind
she was always in danger

now that I'm done
with the malicious idea
of what is eternal,
it is easy for me to look back
at what’s destroyed

we stand
in a hall full of exits
reeking
of invisible tremors
and bloated corpses

birds covet
the seeds of the honey locust—
I don’t protest
as she lays me down
on the cold, bitter ground

certain losses
are irreparable—
hard seeds
in a field made fallow
by a fire set long ago

wounds
hollow and unrecognizable—
the husks of ships,
sheets of dark water
ghosts of what has been lost

leaves shift
as we fade into a pattern
of grass and shadow,
return elated and haunted
to a dark sunrise by the ocean

the fibers
that knit us to the old—
origami
another side of silence,
the breaking of sphinxes

I am a river
that flows past
the city . . .
its soft moaning song
of a child, a belonging

I said,
it's like lifting a cello
out of its case—
“but what do I know
of love's lonely offices”