Haiku and Tanka for Harriet Tubman

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Held between wars
my lifetime
among wars, the big hands of the world of death
my lifetime
listens to yours.

The faces of the sufferers
in the street, in dailiness,

1
She would
sigh, if she
could think of
anything intolerable.
her numbers
fold, in
planes she can

Yes I put her away.
But now life flares up
As safe as China in a cup
You hear the droppings
of her heart.

Leaves rustle on the windowpane.
Three o’clock turns round again.
The man in the moon grows full

in memory of Edmond Jabès


“And so her worries ran on into the other world.”

The Tale of Genji

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There are things
We live among ‘and to see them
Is to know ourselves’.

Occurrence, a part
Of an infinite series,

The sad marvels;

Of this was told

Ar. Now you have been taught words and I am free,
My pine struck open, your thick tongue untied,
And bells call out the music of the sea.

From this advantage I can clearly see
You will abuse me in your grovelling pride
Now you have been taught words: and I am free

To pinch and bully you eternally,
Swish round the island while the mermaids hide

Peace is the active presence of Justice. The wrinkles on the brown face
of the carrying case

I haled me a woman from the street,
Shameless, but, oh, so fair!
I bade her sit in the model’s seat
And I painted her sitting there.

I hid all trace of her heart unclean;
I painted a babe at her breast;
I painted her as she might have been
If the Worst had been the Best.

This is her picture as she was:
It seems a thing to wonder on,
As though mine image in the glass
Should tarry when myself am gone.
I gaze until she seems to stir,—
Until mine eyes almost aver
That now, even now, the sweet lips part
To breathe the words of the sweet heart:—