girls in bikinis
the man I'm with
trying
not to look
- Brenda Gannam
While
the guests order,
the
table cloth hides his hands-
counting
his money
- Clement Hoyt
red light
I study the face
of my tailgater
- Hilary Tann
eye exam
i stop trying
so hard
- Hilary Tann
A selection of classic senryu from old time senryu anthologies in Japan:
when a man
comes asking for a loan
how honest he looks!
someone at the door:
the scolding session
stops - for awhile
when he finally
falls in love with his wife
the end is near
she's been let go
yet in her mother's words
"she's left him"
"Don't let this worry you"
he says, then tells you something
that has to worry you
his wife knows
how to scare a collector:
"He's down with typhoid"
the weapon he uses
for threatening his mother:
a distant land
now that he has a child
he knows all the local dogs
by name
a son kicked out-
several houses down the street
a wife is divorced
the whole town
knows of it, except
the husband
"Bad for my health"-
when you begin to feel so
you've begun to age
the wife-
so much harder to handle
than the mother
