The Other Bunny, February 12, 2024
The woman on my smartphone (and she is not alone in this) says the light that had such a long journey, and the light of its sibling-matter and of its very distant relations that had such a long journey, too, but not quite the same, she says these lights on the night sky know me, and my first cry mingled with time, space, and matter, so the light of the past is my today and my future and my maybe, did I get this right, because lately, I found another matter, very much closer, on the drugstore floor, a matte-peach plastic pet, as big as my thumb, and its body is that of a piglet, but its head is more like a bulldog, so it is a little pigdog, and I put it into my right pocket of my jeans, but at home, I showed it to my son, and we laughed, and how this is such an odd piece of plastic that some human made out of stardust (in the long run), and how it had such a long journey, and nobody can tell me about the hands it has been in and why it ended up in that drugstore except for the law of gravitation and a liability to get lost because it is so tiny, so when I count all the tiles on that floor, and divide it by the number of plastic pets that might have landed on them, is the answer clearly because of the probability of an eon old giant far, far away moving through a manmade interpretation of a constellation because humans love patterns, and humans need reasons, and humans are magical and stupid at the same time, or is it 42?
star signs
connecting the dots
of twin freckles
LITTLE GIRL
Blithe Spirit, Volume 34, Number 1
I am eight years old. My hair is thin, I have short legs. Mum says short hair suits you, it is so much easier to care for. I wear lederhosen, dungarees, jeans. At carnival, the other girls dress up as princesses.
daisy wreaths
from a light blue eggshell
oozing gold
My best friend has a doll’s house. It is fully equipped with electronic lights, wallpaper, elegant dark furniture. Her many Barbies live there, wearing tailored ball gowns.
For my next birthday I ask for a Barbie. Mum says no. They are bad dolls because they are too beautiful. They are wrongly beautiful. I want to be wrongly beautiful. I am wrong because I want that. Mum says you are beautiful the way you are. I half-smile.
abandoned bus stop
i wait in the ev'ning rain
with two umbrellas
Five minutes into the Barbie movie, the tears of my inner little girl run down my face—
first mild night
all the field flowers
black*
*Kingfisher Journal, Issue #8, October 2023
CASTLING, PAWN PROMOTION, EN PASSANT*
The Other Bunny, July 29, 2024
Rules, I hate them
and they should die.
swift tailoring our fair wind
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
* https://www.houseofstaunton.com/special-moves
NAPOLEONES
Anna Lete & Kati Mohr
contemporary haibun online 20.2: August 2024
mother
all I’ve been doing
is nothing
I feel like I’m wasting away on some days. Am I an idiot for having got a degree in the production of communication? I feel like I’m too comfortable; I could do this with my eyes closed, too immersed in this lifestyle of creativity; I could use another topic at the dinner table.
I feel like I should have challenged myself when I had the chance.
stands in the path
a flame tree¹
resisting
I feel like it was a missed opportunity when I walked away from medical school. People think it wasn’t for me—but it was. I feel like I grieved for a bunch of cells and tissue the wrong way, the hard way, the unacceptable way.
I feel like I would do it all over again the exact same way if given the chance.
kalachuchi²
one fits into
the one before
I feel like my son Leon is the best thing to ever happen to me. People think I say it because I’m convincing myself true—but it is. And yet I feel like taking a break from my boys most of the time, like running back to them when they’re not with me, when I am forced to spend time alone drinking my coffee, when I find myself awake in the middle of the night and they’re both asleep.
I feel like I am complete.
sampaguita lei³
its scent from between my eyes
temple stairs
cracking
for the Dama de noche⁴
I feel like I want to do more. I feel like this is enough, this is my peak, this is the highlight of my existence. I feel like I could still reach out to my dreams and just hold them even for a few seconds before surrendering it all back to the Giver.
I feel all these things — I hear my friend Kati telling me, “It’s everything”, all at once.
niyog-niyogan⁵ at night all I’ve been doing is continuing
…………………………………………………
¹Napoleones: a Filipino dessert/snack dish prepared with flaky pastry layers filled with custard and topped with sugar glaze.
²Kalachuchi: flower-bearing trees belonging to the genus Plumeria, grown as ornamentals in the tropical and subtropical areas. In the Philippines, they are also associated with ghosts and death since they are planted in cemeteries and graveyards.
³Jasminum sambac commonly known as Sampaguita was declared as the national flower of the Philippines by Governor-General Frank Murphy in 1934. Its white flower is believed to symbolize purity, fidelity, and hope.
⁴Dama de noche or known as night blooming jasmine is a shrub that bears white flowers giving off a strong sweet perfume at night.
⁵Niyog-niyogan (Quisqualis indica) is a creeping vine whose flowers change colours in 2 to 3 days time when blooming.
pi & anne 