Seven Haikus for September, Twenty-Twenty

Wear your f*cking mask
For neighbors’ and children’s sake
We breathe together

The remaining heat
twists and lashes stubbornly
roaring flame and smoke

Measuring sun, light
Counting hours in endless days
Equinox in abstract

A time for salmon —
Returning to what waters?
A dry, warming home

Listen to the leaves
Wind rising hand forest sweep
They’ve yet to rustle

Will the geese and cranes
still arrive this bleak autumn?
We will migrate, too.

A thousand harvests wane
against man, destroyer of worlds
— but winters bear truths

“Out” © Ben Young Landis